Schwansbell Castle (Lünen)
The Schwansbell Castle in Lünen (Nordrhein-Westfalen) is an old Westphalian moated castle whose moat but not the castle surrounds itself, but a garden island on which originally a small castle stood.
The castle, located about three kilometers outside the town center (in the district and former Horstmar district), has been proven to have been the knight's seat of the Lords of Schwansbell since 1187 . The castle in its current form was built between 1872 and 1875 according to plans by the Dortmund builder Fritz Weber for Wilhelm von Westerholt in the English neo-Gothic style with two octagonal towers.
In the course of the incorporation of the Horstmar district in 1929, the city of Lünen acquired the castle, which was used by the Hitler Youth in 1934 . Later the buildings were used as an orphanage. During the Second World War, the building served as accommodation for the flying crews of the nearby Dortmund Air Base , after the Second World War it was temporarily used as a kind of hospital, and then as a youth / orphanage. Until 1998 the former building department of the city of Lünen was housed in it. For decades, the stability of the castle was questionable because of the mining of the neighboring Prussia colliery and because of the Datteln-Hamm Canal, which runs in the immediate vicinity .
The former building contractor and " Castle King" Herbert Hillebrand bought the castle in 1982 for his daughter Adriana from the city of Lünen and had it restored. The farm building in front of it was used for catering until November 2004; it housed a restaurant that was previously awarded one star in the Michelin Guide . The former restaurant owner and star chef Franz L. Lauter has been working at Nordkirchen Castle since then . After a renovation, Schwansbell Castle is now divided into rental apartments and office space. On November 1, 2008, Hillebrand's property was sold to Initium Germania I CV based in Geffen (Netherlands).
The Lünen City Museum is located in the farm building to the side .
In contrast to the small garden island, the castle park is open to the public and a popular promenade in Lünen. It is home to unusual tree species from eastern North America and south-eastern Europe, such as the trumpet tree , the Christ thorn, robinia or the tulip tree .
The castle is a listed building.
literature
- Christina Krüger: Schwansbell Castle. In: Ministry for Building and Transport of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia / Landschaftsverband Westfalen-Lippe (Hrsg.): Burgen AufRuhr. On the way to 100 castles, palaces and mansions in the Ruhr region . Editor: Kai Niederhöfer. Klartext Verlag, Essen 2010, pp. 360–362.
Web links
Coordinates: 51 ° 36 ′ 12.4 " N , 7 ° 32 ′ 14" E