Why it belongs in ORBIS
Erfurter Blau hand-dyes silk, wool, linen and cotton fabrics with woad, and sells scarves, cloth, watercolours and pastels from its Krämerbrücke workshop. Marlu Müller-Ortloff and Gregor Sauer took over from Rosanna Minelli at the end of 2025.
Rosanna Minelli ran the woad-dyeing workshop Erfurter Blau from the Krämerbrücke, Erfurt's historic merchant bridge. Erfurt's medieval prosperity was built substantially on woad — the plant that yields natural blue dye — which was cultivated across the Thuringian Basin from roughly the 9th through the 19th century; the city's old town still carries visible traces of that legacy.
Under Minelli, the workshop sourced woad leaves from Rose Saatzucht Erfurt's Demeter-certified organic cultivation at the city's edge, extracted the dye, and hand-dyed silk and wool scarves and cotton home textiles in the resulting blue. She collaborated with regional artisans and international designers, and ran dyeing workshops both in Erfurt and further afield in the Harz region, teaching the woad process and natural-material coloring directly.
The workshop continued under Marlu Müller-Ortloff and Gregor Sauer, who took over from Minelli at the end of 2025. Its own team page identifies Minelli as founder and the two successors as owners. The current shop sells woad-dyed scarves and cloth, watercolours and pastels at Krämerbrücke 2, Erfurt. Its contact page invites visitors; it advises calling ahead when travelling from outside Erfurt because dyeing work can cause additional closures.