St Mary's Cathedral and St Michael's Church at Hildesheim

Outside St. Mary's Cathedral there's the "Thousand-year Rose", which is believed to be the oldest living rose in the world. 

St. Michael's Church

This postcard was sent by Sabine

The ancient Benedictine abbey church of St Michael in Hildesheim, located in the north of Germany, is one of the key monuments of medieval art, built between 1010 and 1022 by Bernward, Bishop of Hildesheim. St Michael’s is one of the rare major constructions in Europe around the turn of the millennium which still conveys a unified impression of artistry, without having undergone any substantial mutilations or critical transformations in basic and detailed structures.

St Michael's Church was built on a symmetrical ground plan with two apses that was characteristic of Ottonian Romanesque art in Old Saxony. Its interior, in particular the wooden ceiling and painted stucco-work, together with the treasures of St Mary's Cathedral – in particular its famous bronze doors and the Bernward bronze column – make the property of exceptional interest as examples of the Romanesque churches of the Holy Roman Empire. The harmony of the interior structure of St Michael’s and its solid exterior is an exceptional achievement in architecture of the period. - in: http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/187/

Hildesheim

This postcard was sent by Holger

St Mary's Cathedral, rebuilt after the fire of 1046, still retains its original crypt. The nave arrangement, with the familiar alternation of two consecutive columns for every pillar, was modelled after that of St Michael's, but its proportions are more slender.

The Church of St Michael and the Cathedral of St Mary with its church treasure contain an exceptional series of elements of interior decoration that together are quite unique for the understanding of layouts used during the Romanesque era. - in: http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/187/