Engraved across the portal is Wagner's motto: Hier wo mein Wähnen Frieden fand – Wahnfried – sei dieses Haus von mir benannt ("Here where my delusions have found peace, let this place be named Wahnfried"), which initially caused some amusement among local townsfolk.

[3] Wagner did not spend the closing days of his life at Wahnfried, leaving Bayreuth on 6 September 1882 for the sixth and final time for Venice, where he resided until his death 13 February 1883 at the Palazzo Vendramin-Calergi.

Wagner's body was repatriated to Wahnfried in a public procession through Bayreuth on 18 February,[4] and his grave lies next to that of his wife, Cosima on its grounds.

Leading up to and during World War II, the Bayreuth Festspielhaus and Wahnfried were frequently visited by Adolf Hitler,[5][6] himself an avid admirer of Wagner, but in 1945 the living room with its rotunda and the guest room located on the side and rear of the house were destroyed by allied bombing, along with two-thirds of the rest of Bayreuth.

Over the next three years, the war- and weather-damaged parts of the house were restored to their original state with the recreation of the rotunda, salon and guest room, so that the official inauguration of the Richard Wagner Museum in Bayreuth was able to go ahead as planned on July 24, 1976.