The Zol­lvere­in indus­tri­al com­plex in Land Nor­­drhein-West­­­falen con­sists of the com­plete infra­struc­ture of a his­tor­i­cal coal-min­ing site, with some 20th-cen­­tu­ry build­ings of out­stand­ing archi­tec­tur­al mer­it. It con­sti­tutes remark­able mate­r­i­al evi­dence of the evo­lu­tion and decline of an essen­tial indus­try over the past 150 years.