City of Graz - historical center and Eggenberg Palace

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City of Graz - historical center and Eggenberg Palace
UNESCO world heritage
Core and park-like buffer zone in the inner city
National territory:	Austria
Type:	Culture
Criteria :	ii, iv
Reference No .:	931bis
UNESCO region :	Europe and North America
History of enrollment
Enrollment:	1999  (session 23)

Eggenberg Palace with park and forest, with Stadtberg and Stadtgarten

City of Graz - Historic Center and Eggenberg Castle is the name of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Graz , the capital of Styria in Austria. It includes the old town of Graz ( location ) and Eggenberg Castle ( location ).

Protection goal

“The historic city ​​center and Eggenberg Palace are the reflection of a centuries-long connection between artistic and architectural movements that found their origins in the German and Mediterranean regions and the Balkans . The appearance of the city and castle clearly show their mutual historical and cultural development and form the extraordinary example of a harmonious integration of the architectural styles of successive epochs. "

- UNESCO / CLT / WHC

Graz is registered in two classes, in which the goods show the "development of architecture [...], large-scale sculpture , urban planning " (criterion 2), and those which are an "excellent example of a type of building , architectural [...] Ensembles ”, and thus“ symbolize one or more significant periods of human history ”(criterion 4).

In its entirety, the cityscape is considered to be exceptionally unscathed, also in terms of vision. The architecture spans from Gothic to the 21st century, which is particularly well represented by the Kunsthaus Graz , the “Friendly Alien” ( Peter Cook , Colin Fournier , 2003). A peculiarity is the roof landscape of Graz , which emphasizes the cohesion of the ensemble in its consistently color-shaded red tile covering of the small pitched roofs .

Through its city ​​mountain , the Schloßberg , which with the clock tower also bears the city's landmark, the cityscape can also be experienced directly from an aerial perspective. With Eggenberg Castle, the seat of Eggenberger and Herberstein , in addition to the Duke of Styrian - Inner Austrian town center, raises Graz in the whole of the roots of its urban development represents.

"Compared to other cities in Europe of comparable size, Graz has preserved its urban structure and the rich building fabric, including the roof landscape, which has been developed over the centuries in a surprisingly good way."

- ICOMOS Austria

and display information about the image

Panorama from the Schloßberg; in the middle the Friendly Alien as a conscious signal of modernity, far from the Plabutsch, on which Eggenberg lies.

Scope and history

Originally, in 1999, the city ​​of Graz - Historic Center was defined as the World Heritage within the boundaries of the inner city district and parts of Gries and Lend on the other bank of the Mur .

The core zone of a world heritage site is directly affected by the actual protection. It extends along the line that follows the old Graz city ​​wall : that is (counterclockwise) Mur - Kaiserfeldgasse - Opernring - Burgring - Parkring - the summit of the Schloßberg and back to the Mur. On the right bank of the Mur, the zone boundary runs north of the Murinsel - Ökonomiegasse - and the back of the row of houses out of town Mariahiferstraße - Griesgasse - and on Nikolaiplatz to the Mur.

The buffer zone of a world heritage should enable environmental protection. In Graz, this includes the area of ​​the former Glacis (the apron of the city wall), i.e. the line Radetzkystraße - Jakominiplatz - Gleisdorferstraße - Glacisstraße around the city ​​park - Parkstraße - Wickenburgstraße , including the wooded north flank of the Schloßberg. On the right side of the Mur, it encompasses the Andräviertel and the houses up to the border between Griesplatz and Radetzkybrücke . In the 2007 management plan, it was planned to extend the buffer zone to the entire Franz-Josefs-Kai and the southern Lendviertel, up to Keplerstraße - Volksgartenstraße , including Lendplatz .

With the expansion in 2010 to include Eggenberg Castle, which is located at the foot of the Plabutsch in the west of the city center, there is the possibility of adding to the protected area. The second part of the core area includes the castle with park and avenue. The buffer zone runs on Algersdorfer Straße around Bad Eggenberg and the ASKÖ stadium - the LKH / UKH are left out - to Alteggenberg, and - including extensive forests on Plabutsch (Grabenwald) - back via Eckerstraße - Karl-Morre-Straße .

This part is located in the Eggenberg district (or the Algersdorf cadastral community ). The new zone extends the range of protection by a large urban open space. In addition, the entire Annenstrasse / Stauchergasse - Eggenberger Strasse street is part of the buffer zone, which means that the city's historic transverse axis is also protected. Because of the urban planning significance of this measure, the landscape architect Hal Moggridge was consulted for the negotiations with UNESCO , with special support from ICOMOS , the international monument protection organization.

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Panorama of the main square in Graz

Web links

• Entry on the UNESCO World Heritage Center website ( English and French ).
• Map of Inscribed Property 2010 (whc.unesco.org, pdf)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} “Criterion (ii): The City of Graz - Historic Center and Schloss Eggenberg reflects artistic and architectural movements originating from the Germanic region, the Balkans and the Mediterranean, for which it served as a crossroads for centuries. The greatest architects and artists of these different regions expressed themselves forcefully here and thus created a brilliant syntheses.
   Criterion (iv): The urban complex forming the City of Graz - Historic Center and Schloss Eggenberg is an exceptional example of a harmonious integration of architectural styles from successive periods. Each age is represented by typical buildings, which are often masterpieces. The physiognomy of the city and of the castle faithfully tells the story of their common historic and cultural development. “
   Cultural Properties - City of Graz - Historic Center and Schloss Eggenberg (Austria) , Decision 34COM 8B.37, 2009; German translation Austrian UNESCO Commission, on Austrian World Heritage Sites ( Memento of the original from June 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , unesco.at, accessed May 9, 2012
2. ↑ See UNESCO World Heritage Site - Graz is a World Heritage Site ( Memento of the original from September 3, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , City Development Graz »Baukultur
3. ↑ Cf. Günther Rath: The historical roof in Graz and its development history . In: The historical roof - development history, integration, restoration using the example of Graz. Graz 2005. ( Reading excerpt, pdf ( Memento of the original dated November 27, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this note. ); Roof landscape , website of the sheet metal roofing company Rath & Rath 
4. ↑ ^{a b c} Schloss Eggenberg is a World Heritage Site - Decision made at the 34th UNESCO Annual Meeting ( Memento of the original from August 20, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) 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. , City Development Graz »Baukultur
5. ↑ Quote ICOMOS Austria Austrian World Heritage Sites  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. → City of Graz - historical center and Eggenberg Palace (1999 and 2010)  
6. ↑ This was commissioned at the 30th meeting of the World Heritage Committee in Vilnius in 2006 to enable the expansion to include Eggenberg. Eggenberg Palace is a World Heritage Site ( Memento of the original from August 20, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The  archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , City Development Graz