Freienwalde Castle

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Freienwalde Castle (summer 1907)

Freienwalde Palace was built in Freienwalde in Brandenburg as the summer residence of the Prussian Queen Friederike Luise , wife of Friedrich Wilhelm II . The more recent history of the building, built in the classicism style, is closely linked to Walther Rathenau , who acquired the castle in 1909 from the crown property.

history

Entrance page 2012
Southern narrow side 2010
Balcony from 1909 on the northern narrow side
Castle Park
Tea house from 1790

After the death of King Friedrich Wilhelm II, Queen Friederike Luise had the local master mason Anton Hilke work out plans for the construction of a summer palace in the south of the city on the so-called Apothekerberg, which she had already horticulturalized in previous years and a tea house (1790) had had them equipped. The design was commissioned by Friedrich Wilhelm III in 1798 . Revised by the secret senior building officer David Gilly , who was able to report the successful completion of the construction work almost within the specified budget of 20,500 thalers the following year.

The building is a broad, rectangular, two-storey villa with five or four axes, the only decoration of which originally consisted of a circumferential cornice on the lower edge of the upper floor. The flat roof was previously only covered with sheet metal.

When the queen died in 1805, the castle was initially empty for a while. In 1822 the park was redesigned by the landscape architect Peter Joseph Lenné . At the end of the 1820s, the Polish Prince Anton Heinrich Radziwill spent several summers there. During this time, the castle appears to have been renovated, with the facade being given a vertical structure through cut pilasters. In 1834 his daughter Elisa Radziwill , who was ill with tuberculosis, died there during a cure for which she was King Friedrich Wilhelm III. invited.

In 1909 the industrialist, writer and politician Walther Rathenau acquired the castle and literally tore it from its slumber. According to plans by the architect Johannes Kraaz , he had the cornice removed, the pilasters smoothed and capped. A semicircular balcony was built on the northern narrow side of the house, the rectangular window openings behind it were extended as arched windows. Rathenau took over larger parts of the largely preserved interior furnishings of the 18th century from the royal court chamber and had the partly decayed Parisian wallpaper renewed based on models in the Gilly castles of Paretz and Kleinmachnow . Except for the merging of two rooms in the basement, he refrained from major renovations inside.

After Walther Rathenau's murder in 1922, his heirs bequeathed the castle to the Oberbarnim district in 1926 with the stipulation that Rathenau's spiritual legacy and memory be preserved in this place for all time. After 1945, however, the castle was looted and almost all traces of memory removed. In the GDR it served as the Pushkin House of the Society for German-Soviet Friendship .

After the fall of the Wall, the castle was taken over again in 1991 by the Bad Freienwalde district and in 1996 it was spun off into a Kultur GmbH along with other facilities. After extensive renovation, a Rathenau memorial was created in the castle. The first floor housed a permanent exhibition on the history of the building.

At the end of 2016 the Kultur GmbH was closed for financial reasons. The Rathenau memorial could only be visited with prior registration. The first floor has been cleared and is no longer accessible to visitors.

The castle is to be sold. A Europe-wide call for tenders ended on March 21, 2019.

Since the reunification , concerts and theater performances as well as film screenings and other artistic performances have taken place in the former royal theater, a tea house in the park of the castle . In 1995, for example, the Circus Krone held an event there.

Web links

Commons : Schloss Freienwalde  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

literature

  • Theodor Fontane : Walks through the Mark Brandenburg Volume 2 ( The Oderland ) "The Oderbruch and its surroundings" - Freienwalde: The castle
  • Sibylle Badstübner-Gröger (Ed.): Freienwalde . Series Palaces and Gardens of the Mark , self-published by the Deutsche Gesellschaft e. V., 2nd, revised edition, Berlin 1996
  • Martin Sabrow : restorer of another modernism. Rathenau and Schloss Freienwalde, in: W. Delabar / D. Heimböckel (ed.), Walther Rathenau. The Phenotype of Modernity, Bielefeld 2009. pp. 181–193.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Thomas Lackmann: The future is uncertain. Freienwalde Castle has an eventful history. But since this week it is unclear how the castle and museum will continue. In: Der Tagesspiegel. July 1, 2016, accessed March 3, 2017 .
  2. ↑ schloss-freiwalde.de: Schloss Freienwalde closed until further notice. February 1, 2017, accessed March 3, 2017 .
  3. ↑ Steffen Göttmann: Without a farewell party in retirement. Reinhard Schmook closes the door to his office for the last time today as castle castellan. In: Märkische Oderzeitung. January 30, 2017, accessed March 3, 2017 .
  4. ↑ Brandenburger Schloss for sale: The price is not decisive
  5. ↑ Bad Freienwalde A castle for one euro?

Coordinates: 52 ° 47 '2.3 "  N , 14 ° 1' 53.4"  E