Blüherpark
The Blüherpark is a public green space in Dresden . The facility, whose origins go back to the 17th century, is located near the city center. When this cultural monument was largely destroyed in World War II , most of the original structures were lost. The restoration of the Blüherpark has been taking place since 2006. In May 2008, as a first step, its central part was handed over to the public. The Blüherpark as a whole is under monument protection, cf. List of monument conservation issues in Dresden #Parks and squares .
location
The Blüherpark is located about 800 m southeast of the Altmarkt and is therefore in the immediate vicinity of the historic town center . In the middle is the German Hygiene Museum . The Bürgerwiese , the Güntzwiesen with the Dynamo Stadium , the town hall , the Transparent Factory and the former headquarters of VEB Robotron are also in the vicinity . At the level of the Blüherpark, east of Zinzendorfstrasse, the originally densely built-up city center merges into the large, central green areas of the Great Garden . The Blüherpark is bounded to the north by Lingnerallee and to the east by Blüherstrasse. So it is actually in the Pirnaische Vorstadt and with it in the district of Altstadt I and the district of Altstadt .
In the course of the reorganization of the Dresden urban area in 1991, when local office areas (since 2018: city districts) and statistical city districts were created, the southern part of the Pirnaische Vorstadt was assigned as statistical district 036 to the statistical district Seevorstadt-Ost / Großer Garten with Strehlen-Nordwest to. The park area has lost its originally clear demarcation from the surrounding area and is also divided into two parts by the Hygiene Museum, of which today only the somewhat larger southern part with an area of 4.7 hectares is called the actual Blüherpark. The statistical district 036, i.e. the Blüherpark and its largely undeveloped surrounding area, had fewer than ten inhabitants in 1992. The Blüherpark is connected to the public transport network via tram lines 10 and 13 (Großer Garten stop) .
history
From the Rechenbergschen to the Zinzendorfschen garden
In 1639, the Electorate Court Marshal Johann Georg von Rechenberg acquired the property of today's Blüherpark, which at that time was outside the Dresden city walls, southeast of the Johanniskirchhof in front of the Pirnaischer Tor , and had a pleasure palace built 14 years later . At the northern end there was a Vorwerk . In 1682, Elector Johann Georg III bought. the so-called Rechenberg Garden and merged it with the neighboring Taubesche Garden , so that Johann Friedrich Karcher designed the small pleasure garden for courtly festivities. This was done according to the fashion of the time, based on the French model. The resulting baroque garden was also known as the long garden because of its elongated shape . Among other things, a 280 m long gondola basin with two ponds at its ends was built, which was fed by the Kaitzbach . Coming from the Great Garden, this flowed past south of the garden. Countess Margarethe Susanne von Zinzendorf (1660–1722), who was revered by the Elector, received the garden as a gift in January 1688, which is why it was later called the Zinzendorf Garden . It remained in the possession of the von Zinzendorf family until 1694 .
Bourgeois ownership and use of housing
Lieutenant Christoph Winkler bought the garden in 1703 and thus brought it into civil possession for the first time. Associated with this was its use for commercial purposes. Apartments were furnished and rented here.
Palais des Chevalier de Saxe and Prince George Garden
On November 27, 1764, Prince Johann Georg , an illegitimate son of Augustus the Strong with the title Chevalier de Saxe , bought the garden, which is still outside the city, for 14,000 thalers in order to build a maison de plaisance in the center of the site . To do this, he commissioned Friedrich August Krubsacius , who drove forward the construction of a new palace , which was completely completed in 1770 . This so-called Palais des Chevalier de Saxe or Palais des Prinzen Johann Georg was executed in a simple and reserved late baroque- early classical style. The building decorations came from the sculptor Johann Gottfried Knöffler (1715–1779). The interiors were not overly large for the time. Despite all the princely elegance, attention was paid to comfortable living and thus created an overall atmosphere of elegant simplicity. Long outbuildings, which housed utility and functional rooms, were connected directly to the side of the palace.
With the inclusion of some fields already on the property, the garden was expanded and completely redesigned. For this purpose, a main axis oriented towards the palace was laid out and the garden was designed strictly axially symmetrical according to French architectural principles, so that all essential parts of the so-called Prince George Garden were clearly visible from the salon. After he left the military , Johann Georg moved to his country house on January 30, 1770. In accordance with the contemporary desire for intimacy, he lived here very secluded, but continued to hold a large court . After his death on February 25, 1774, an inheritance dispute developed between his half-sister Friederike Alexandrine Countess von Moszyńska , who was the sole heir in his will, and the Order of Malta , of which the Chevalier de Saxe had been a member since 1728 and to which all property should have fallen according to the privileges of the order. The order won the following legal process and thus received the property including the palace and garden.
Secondary garden
From 1781, after a donation from Maria Antonia Walpurgis , the widow of Elector Friedrich Christian , the property belonged to the second-born Saxon prince and was named after him, which is why it was also known as the Palais of Secondary Education . This system is not to be confused with the secondary building on Brühl's Terrace, which the second-born prince only used as a library and to store his graphic collection. At first the palace in the garden of the second generation became the main residence of Prince Anton , who became King of Saxony in 1827. As the first garden in Dresden, Anton had it redesigned into an English landscape garden from 1782 to 1783 in accordance with the taste of the time .
According to the plans of Johann August Giesel , a pupil of the master builder Krubsacius, the Rechenberg gondola canal, which was still partially preserved, was filled in and the Kaitzbach meandered through the park instead . In addition, an artificially antiqued ruin , an aviary , a grotto as well as various pavilions and a hermitage were built . Thaddäus Ignatius Wiskotschill contributed the figure decorations . As an English garden, the garden of the secondary school gained some fame at the time. Several important Wettins were born in the palace over the years, including King Johann on December 12, 1801 and his grandson Friedrich August III. , the last king of Saxony, on May 25th, 1865. In the middle of the 19th century a small house chapel was added to the palace. In 1888 the city of Dresden bought the northern part of the garden to create today's Lingnerallee, then Johann-Georgen-Allee. Until 1918 the palace remained the official main residence of the second-born Wettin prince. Between 1902 and 1926 Johann Georg Prince of Saxony was the last Wettin owner. After the First World War , he had the facility redesigned again under the supervision of Friedrich Bouché . In the front part of the garden was the Zinzendorf amusement bar .
German Hygiene Museum and Blüherpark
In 1926, the city of Dresden also acquired the remainder of the property, which at that time was still around 9 hectares in size, from the Wettins. This was followed by deep interventions in its structure, which had largely been preserved from the 18th century. Just one year later, the city made a large part of the facility, around 3 hectares, available as a building site for the new Hygiene Museum . This decision was preceded by long discussions among Dresden city planners about its location. Decisive for the agreement on this sensitive area as a building site was the proximity to the large garden as well as to the exhibition area and the stadium, which had been in existence since 1896 and which was renewed as Ilgen arena in 1923 . As an essential urban planning guideline, the main avenue of the Great Garden was extended towards the city center and the Hygiene Museum was placed at its end. The aim was to do justice to the educational importance of the building and its hoped-for international appeal. It was finally built between 1927 and 1930 under the direction of Wilhelm Kreis (1873–1955) regardless of the location and cubature of the old palace, which in itself remained untouched, but from then on looked like a rear building of this new urban dominant and was completely devalued.
These changes had a drastic effect on the garden , the entirety of which could no longer be grasped. In the course of the completion of the German Hygiene Museum in 1930 and on the occasion of the II. International Hygiene Exhibition , it was redesigned as a public park . Popular recreation was in the foreground of this new concept, about whose connection with the Hygiene Museum very little is known. The path system was simplified, the artificial watercourse was filled in and playgrounds were set up. A pavilion was still used as a kindergarten . In 1931 the site was given the current name Blüherpark , which is reminiscent of Bernhard Blüher , Dresden's mayor from 1915 to 1931. Five years after the Beutlerpark, a second public park was given the name of a previous mayor . Just a few years later, after the National Socialists came to power, the redesign of the south of the Pirnaische Vorstadt into the new Saxon Gauforum was planned. The Blüherpark would also have been affected. The old palace, which was not at right angles to the main axis and displeased by the new rulers at this location, was threatened with demolition. However, the plans were not implemented because of the Second World War . Shortly before its end, the area was destroyed by the air raids on Dresden . The palace burned out completely.
Post-war period until around 2000
After the Second World War, parts of the Blüherpark were rededicated - its restoration began in 1950. The question of the reconstruction of the palace, which at least had been preserved within its walls, was very controversial even among monument protection circles. Proponents of the demolition argued that several renovations over time had removed almost all of the original components. In 1951 the palace and some neighboring small buildings were demolished. Only ceramic plates with blue painting were seized . The wall paintings of the small house chapel were already too weathered and were not recovered.
Two years after the palace was demolished, a herb garden was created in the Blüherpark , operated by the Hygiene Museum. Medicinal , poisonous and aromatic plants grew here . The baroque vases that have adorned the garden for centuries are still preserved. The initially still existing artificial ruin from 1783 was later demolished. A children's playground was built in the 1960s . Over the decades, the Blüherpark site lost its former function as a public park and part of the 200 hectare urban recreation area rich in green spaces . It looked to a large extent like an outdoor facility of the Hygiene Museum, although its history goes back much further than that of the dominant neighboring building. Residents used it as a passage to the weekly market on the Cockerwiese on Lingnerallee.
Overall, the Blüherpark was quite unknown to the people of Dresden compared to the Great Garden and other public green spaces . This was also due to the fact that its visitors can no longer experience it as a whole, as the Hygiene Museum was built right into it. The southern part with its dense network of paths and trees as well as the many meadows and seating was also increasingly in contrast to the northern part, which largely consists of an open space. The museum's own medicinal herb garden and the playground were inadequately connected to their surroundings and distorted the historical context. (: School Child Guidance "Erich Kaestner" today) of the Hygiene Museum at the Zinzendorfstraße and including through the south than further cuts to the park area in 1968, the construction of the 19 Polytechnic High School apply SG Dynamo Dresden used Traglufthalle ten years later. Since the early 1990s, the St. Nicholas Run, organized by Post SV Dresden , has also taken place in the Blüherpark .
Redesign of the central part of the park from 2006 to 2008
Since the beginning of 2006 - after the work on the Hygiene Museum has been completed - the Blüherpark has been gradually restored. First of all, the central part of the park, about 3 hectares in size, was redesigned over a two-year construction period. The aim of these measures was to create an attractive and lively park directly south of the museum, in which parts of the historic park with its elements from four layers of time can be seen. In addition, the Blüherpark should better serve its connection function between the Great Garden and the old town, offer more opportunities for recreation and facilitate access to the Hygiene Museum. The old medicinal herb garden between the museum and the Erich Kästner School building had to give way to this project. A citizen's appeal by the Saxon newspaper in February 2007, which called for memories and photos from the Blüherpark before 1945 to be sent in, was helpful for the project . In April 2007 the air dome was also demolished, on the site of which a children's playground was built. At the same time the remains of the palace were uncovered, whereby the responsible construction companies had to move a total of approx. 4000 m³ of rubble.
Subsequently, the main axis of the park, which had existed since the time of the French garden, was restored to its condition from the 1930s. A rose parterre from the 1930s has also been rebuilt. In addition, the round courtyard fountain , which had served as a planting bowl for several decades, was renewed. The plastic Hygieia by the sculptor Karl Albiker was moved to the inner courtyard of the Hygiene Museum. A reconstruction of the palace, however, was not planned, but its spatial experience. For this purpose, the approx. 0.5 m high foundation walls were exposed, on which there are also remains of old staircases, gutters and iron window bars. Subsequently, the former location of the palace was slightly raised with earthworks and partly planted; the now buried foundation underneath could thus be preserved for posterity. In addition to the 200,000 euros contributed by the city of Dresden, the measures were financed by a further 70,000 euros from the EU project GreenKeys - Urban Green as a Key to Sustainable Cities , in which the Saxon capital and eleven other EU cities participated. Two panels explain the history of the Blüherpark and the EU funding project, which was formally ended when it was handed over to the public on May 4th, 2008.
In summer 2008, new seating was created and more trees were planted. The baroque sandstone vases from the Great Garden were placed again on the pedestals that were still in place. The sculptures Hercules and Megara , Merkur and Minerva as well as Mars and Venus , which had been stored since 1976, could be restored and put up again with funds from the estate of a former Dresden woman.
Planning
The redesign of the part of the park north of the Hygiene Museum and the associated western extension of Herkulesallee with new plantings will follow later. The only remaining building from the times before the Hygiene Museum was built, an octagonal gatehouse on Lingnerallee, is to get its counterpart, which has long since been demolished, a few meters away. The exact time for the start of this work is still open, but should (as of 2017) be in 2019. The Blüherpark is supposed to correspond with the Skaterpark Lingnerallee on the other side of the museum, which was inaugurated in October 2006. The Dresden city council rejected the proposed reconstruction of the palace in November 2017.
literature
in alphabetical order by authors / editors
- Barbara Bechter: From the Rechenberg Gardens to the Blüher Park . In: Die Gartenkunst , 17, 1/2005, pp. 112–245; ( uni-heidelberg.de (PDF; 26 MB))
- Katja Hartmann: The Blüherpark in Dresden - Investigation of the history of the facility and the development conception of garden monument preservation considering future usage requirements . Diploma thesis (degree course land care), Dresden 2001.
- Katrin Hecht: The Blüherpark site in Dresden - A consideration of the socio-economic interrelationships between the park and its surroundings . Diploma thesis (study course geography), Dresden 2007.
- State capital Dresden (Ed.): Blüherpark Dresden - Development of the historical park . 2007; ioer.de (PDF; 3.8 MB)
- State palaces, castles and gardens of Saxony (Ed.): The garden travel guide - Saxony Green, the 72 most worth seeing gardens and parks. L & H Verlag, 2006, ISBN 3-938608-02-1 .
- Rudi Warnatsch: The Dresdner Blüherpark and its history (s) . Green keys to the city.
Web links
- Hygiene Museum and Blüherpark
- Bürgerwiese and Blüherpark
- Brief history of the Blüherpark
- Redesign of the Blüherpark
- Pictures of the Blüherpark before 2006
Individual evidence
- ↑ Robotron Office Center: The Object ( Memento from March 3, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
- ↑ a b Blüherpark Dresden - Development of the historical park. (PDF; 3.8 MB) State capital Dresden, December 2007, accessed on August 3, 2016 .
- ↑ Districts. (No longer available online.) In: German OnLine. 1997, archived from the original on June 21, 2003 ; accessed on June 15, 2015 .
- ↑ a b Barbara Bechter: From Rechenberg Gardens to Blüher Park: The checkered history of a Dresden garden . In: The garden art . tape 17 , 2005, pp. 112 ff . ( uni-heidelberg.de [PDF; 26.0 MB ]).
- ↑ Secondary education. In: Dresden-Lexikon.de. Retrieved June 15, 2015 .
- ↑ Genia Bleier: The old Dresden excavated in the Blüherpark. In: Dresdner Latest News , May 5, 2008, p. 15.
- ^ German Hygiene Museum: Monumental mixture of neoclassical and triumphant modernity. In: das-neue-dresden.de. Retrieved June 15, 2015 .
- ↑ The planned "Gauforum Dresden": Tool for mass manipulation - gigantomania of German fascism. In: das-neue-dresden.de. Retrieved June 15, 2015 .
- ↑ Blüherpark. In: Dresden-Lexikon.de. Retrieved June 15, 2015 .
- ↑ Matthias Lerm : Farewell to the old Dresden , 2nd edition, Hinstorff-Verlag 2001, p. 103.
- ↑ School for Educational Aid "Erich Kästner". Retrieved June 15, 2015 .
- ^ Postportverein Dresden e. V. - Athletics Department. Retrieved June 15, 2015 .
- ↑ Andrea Nehring: Blüherpark is being redesigned . In: Dresdner Latest News . May 6, 2006, p. 15 ( online ).
- ↑ Vera Kliemann: The Hygieia moves into the inner courtyard . In: Saxon newspaper . November 15, 2005 ( online ).
- ^ Dresden, Blüherpark. (No longer available online.) In: greenkeys.org. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016 ; accessed on June 15, 2015 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Vera Kliemann: Going for a walk on the old palace walls . In: Saxon newspaper . February 2, 2006, p. 20 ( online ).
- ↑ Lars Kühl: Robotron canteen would have to give way for Blüherpark . In: Saxon newspaper . January 31, 2017 ( online ).
- ↑ Thomas Baumann-Hartwig: Prinzenpalais in the Dresdner Blüherpark is not being reconstructed . In: Dresdner Latest News . November 3, 2017 ( online ).
Coordinates: 51 ° 2 ′ 34 " N , 13 ° 44 ′ 43" E