Waldhaus Wilhelmsthal
The Waldhaus is a listed building in the Wilhelmsthal district of the Gerstungen municipality in the Wartburg district in Thuringia .
history
The Waldhaus Wilhelmsthal was built in the Biedermeier style around 1780 as the guest house of Wilhelmsthal Castle.
From 1903 to 1906 the forest house was fundamentally rebuilt and from then on used as a residential and administrative building for the forest administration, initially even after the castle and its outbuildings were sold to the Thuringian Ministry of Finance in 1941. Towards the end of the Second World War , a military hospital as well as emergency housing and accommodation for forced laborers were set up in the building. In 1945 the forest house was confiscated by the Red Army and used as an army camp, later as a refugee camp.
After the war, the forest house was converted into a home for foresters, teachers and craftsmen, a sales point for the consumer cooperative was set up on the ground floor, as was a vocational school for cooks.
After the fall of the Wall , the forest house was cleared in the early 1990s and the demolition of the run-down building was planned. From 2000 to 2006 the building was extensively renovated and subsequently served as the domicile of an art association. For the design of the facade, the owners were awarded the Wartburg District Monument Prize.
Design
The 33 m × 12.5 m building has a staircase on both the west and east sides. In keeping with the Biedermeier style, there are two symmetrical salons on the first floor in the western and eastern corners of the building.
The ground floor was originally used to shelter horses and carriages and had two gate openings. A separate room served as the groom's living space. The house had a wine cellar, a well and an oven. A special feature of the construction period was an internal toilet installed on the east side of the house.
During the renovation at the beginning of the twentieth century, the second gate opening of the passage on the ground floor was closed, the stable was divided into several rooms in which, among other things, an inn and later a sales point were set up in the 1940s.
Web links
Coordinates: 50 ° 55 ′ 1 ″ N , 10 ° 18 ′ 24.5 ″ E