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🌧️ +8°C, 70% chance of rain, breezy. January in Frankfurt.

Adi Uhl is closing his shop after 47 years, the raccoons are winning, and Frankfurt just became Germany's first World Design Capital. Some weeks write themselves.

Hidden in Schwalbach and Kronberg is a building where 2,500 people from 60 countries spend their days thinking about diapers. P&G's German Innovation Center is the company's largest R&D hub outside the United States. And their latest breakthrough? A small pocket on the back of Pampers called the "Stopp- und Schutztäschchen."

It took two years to develop. They worked with 800 local families who tested prototypes and reported back on the one thing every parent dreads: the blowout. The pocket catches what the diaper misses.

This is what €2.2 billion in annual German R&D spending actually looks like. Not press releases about innovation. Just people in Taunus suburbs solving problems you didn't know had solutions.

Frankfurt's economy isn't always banks. Sometimes it's baby wipes.

The Frankfurt prosecutor has charged a 15-year-old Dutch national with attempted murder for the August firebombing of Café Omonia in Bockenheim. Five people were inside when he threw a firework and several liters of accelerant through the door.

Investigators believe it was a contract job. The term they use is "Crime-as-a-Service." Someone paid to have the café attacked. Someone else recruited the teenager. He was brought to Frankfurt specifically to do it.

The kid is 15. He traveled internationally to commit arson for money. The people who hired him are still out there. The café survived. Questions haven't been answered.

Adi Uhl arrived in Frankfurt as a young man. He remembers his first impression: "Kaiserstraße, Autos, Menschen, Licht. Da bist du richtig." Cars, people, light. You're in the right place.

He worked as a welder. He collected instruments on the side. Eventually the collection became a shop. Musikhaus Bornheim opened 47 years ago. Guitars and banjos hung from the ceiling. Hammond organs sat in corners. Adi knew where everything was.

Now he's 83. His wife needs care. A successor has been found, but first the inventory has to go. If you've ever wanted a saxophone from a shop that smells like wood polish and decades, the clock is running.

Hesse has at least 120,000 raccoons. The animals came from North America, escaped from fur farms, and never left. Now they eat amphibians, raid attics, and breed faster than hunters can shoot.

Last year, Hessian hunters killed 41,147 raccoons. A 10% increase from the year before. It wasn't enough. The state is lifting the closed season. Year-round hunting starts soon.

The raccoons don't know this. They're busy in your garden shed.

January 16–19, 2026

The activist grandmothers honored for civil engagement. Eintracht honorary president Peter Fischer gives the laudatory speech. 📍 Haus der Jugend | Saturday 3pm

Club Nights

Frankfurt's anniversary year. Meder Spielwaren turns 150. Lufthansa turns 100. Batschkapp turns 50. Schirn turns 40. Love Family Park turns 30. The city measures time in toy stores, airlines, punk clubs, art halls, and techno festivals.

Since the FDP left the ruling coalition in summer 2025, Frankfurt's city parliament has operated without a fixed majority. Unlike federal politics, this doesn't trigger new elections.

The Hessische Gemeindeordnung is designed for continuity. The mayor is directly elected by citizens. Department heads serve staggered six-year terms. The executive stays in place regardless of coalition math.

What changes is how laws pass. The city parliament now builds issue-by-issue majorities, negotiating with different parties depending on the topic. Planning Dezernent Marcus Gwechenberger calls it a "new dynamic." More transparency. More cross-party dialogue. Less backroom dealing.

Whether it's sustainable is unclear. But Frankfurt is running a live experiment in consensus democracy, and so far the city hasn't stopped functioning.

That's all for this week. Stay sharp, Frankfurt.

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