Henriette Wägerle was born in Stuttgart in 1957. After studying political science, sociology and modern German literature, she completed postgraduate studies in journalism at the University of Hohenheim in 1985. During her studies, she was a co-founder of the TAZ and subsequently worked for a long time (1979-1985) as an editor and journalist in the Munich office.
From 1988, Henriette Wägerle was press spokesperson for the city council faction of the Munich Greens. In 1990, her professional focus changed to economic and labour market policy and she became head of the department "Municipal Employment Policy and Qualification" in the Department of Labour and Economy.
Based on this experience, she founded one of the first municipal consultancies to accompany structural change (VSW) in 1994. The aim was to avoid redundancies and to adopt new approaches such as employment companies, working time reduction models or early qualification. She was managing director there until 2000 and then moved to the Federal Ministry of Health, where she developed an employment policy concept for health policy and was a member of the "Alliance for Work". From 2001 to 2002, she worked as office manager for the parliamentary group leader Kerstin Müller in the Green parliamentary group in the Bundestag.
Afterwards, Henriette Wägerle returned to local politics and was in charge of the city-wide project coordination for the 2006 Football World Cup in Munich.
She currently heads the "Europe and International Cooperation" department of the City of Munich. This department represents the city's interests in Brussels, cooperates intensively with European and African cities and supervises numerous transnational projects. Currently, municipal cooperation opportunities are being developed with neighbouring cities on the Syrian border and in the southern Mediterranean region.
Henriette Wägerle continuously participates in election observations on behalf of the OSCE and the EU, especially in the transition countries of the East and on the African continent.
Henriette Wägerle has long been associated with the Green-affiliated foundations: as a member of the general assembly, as a member of the selection committee for study scholarships and as a board member of the Petra Kelly Foundation in Munich.