On the corner of the Brühl and Katharinenstrasse stands the Romanus house, built for the mayor of Leipzig between 1701 and 1704, and one of the finest baroque buildings remaining in the town.

A synagogue was established in 1763, and Jews visiting the annual Leipzig Fair would lodge in the Brühl and the surrounding streets.

[7]In 1938, under the Nazi government, "the entire Brühl district changed hands, as fur firms — the pinnacle of Jewish commerce in the city, along with the department stores — were stolen from their owners".

Ironically, Wagner's disciple Theodor Uhlig, in an 1850 essay which Wagner was later to build on for his own essay Das Judenthum in der Musik, condemned the music of Meyerbeer by linking it to the Jewish quarters of Leipzig and Dresden: 'If that is dramatic song, then Gluck, Mozart, Cherubini and Spontini carried out their studies at the Neumarkt in Dresden or the Brühl in Leipzig.

The appearance of the department store changed radically in 1968 when it was coated with a paraboloid-patterned aluminium façade, designed by Harry Müller.

This building, which became disused in the 21st century, and a number of adjoining residential Plattenbauten, were replaced by a shopping mall called "Höfe am Brühl",[11] which opened in 2012.