Herrenhausen Gardens

Coordinates: 52°23′30″N 9°41′54″E / 52.39167°N 9.69833°E / 52.39167; 9.69833
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

The Great Garden, c. 1708
Aerial image of the Herrenhausen Gardens from its south, showing the Great Garden in front of, and the Hill Garden behind, the Herrenhausen Palace towards the top of the image

The Herrenhausen Gardens (

Lower Saxony, Germany. Dating to the era of the Kings of Hanover, they comprise Great Garden (Großer Garten), Hill Garden (Berggarten), Georgen Garden (Georgengarten) and Guelf Garden (Welfengarten).[1]

The Great Garden has always been one of the most distinguished

English gardens
and are considered popular recreation areas for the residents of Hanover. The history of the gardens spans several centuries, and they remain a popular attraction to this day.

Great Garden

In 2016, German Chancellor Angela Merkel welcomed the 44th President of the United States of America Barack Obama in the Great Garden.[3]
Fountain in the Great Garden
The reconstructed Herrenhausen Palace in 2013
The Gallery building in the Great Garden
The Orangery building in the Great Garden

The Great Garden owes much of its aesthetics to Sophia of Hanover, consort of the Elector of Hanover and herself heiress to the British throne, who commissioned the French gardener Martin Charbonnier  [de; it] in 1683 to enlarge an existing garden. It served as a summer retreat, located only a few kilometers outside the city, while the Leine Palace was the main residence in the city. As its name implies, it indeed became a large garden, comprising 50 hectares (120 acres) of lawns, hedges, walkways, and statues arranged in strict geometrical patterns.

Centrepiece of the garden is the, rather small,

George III, who never visited Herrenhausen, had the palace modernized in neoclassical style by Georg Ludwig Friedrich Laves
.

The Great Garden suffered immense damage during World War II; the British Royal Family had requested the Royal Air Force not to attack the palace,[2][4][5] at the time still owned by the House of Hanover, but it was damaged by bombs during an air raid in 1943.[6][7][8] The ruins of the palace were almost completely torn down after the war; the outside staircase once leading up to the entrance was salvaged[9] from the debris and moved next to the Orangerie building where it can be seen today. In 2009, the decision was made to rebuild the palace, construction began in 2010,[10] and the rebuilt Herrenhausen Palace was reopened on 18 January 2013.[11]

Every summer, the Great Garden plays host a large variety of festivals. The 'Festival of Small Arts' (Kleinkunstfestival) takes place over several days and offers a wide range of artistic displays, and the 'Small Festival in the Great Garden' (Kleines Fest im Großen Garten) has become firmly entrenched as a highlight of the 'Festival Week Herrenhausen' (Festwochen Herrenhausen). Lastly, the garden is the site of an international fireworks competition which evolved from a local attraction.[2]

The 'State Stage of Hanover' (Landesbühne Hannover) uses the Garden Theatre of the Great Garden during the summer for both

Gottfried Leibniz and was inaugurated in 1719 during the visit of George I
. In 1721, it reached a height of some 35 metres (115 ft) which made it the highest fountain in European courts. The fountain and its pumping works were renewed in 1860.

The Great Garden is also the site of one of the last works of the artist

seashells. Between 2001 and 2003, when the exhibit opened, de Saint Phalle and her coworkers covered the walls and interior with mosaics
of molded glass and mirrors. Two rooms branch off from the octagon-shaped central room, and on the front wall of each of them is a statue set within a small recession in the wall. De Saint Phalle's intention for this exhibit was that the visitors could use the grotto as a cool retreat on hot summer days while at the same time being enchanted by the decorations.

  • One of the alleys
    One of the alleys
  • Fountain
    Fountain
  • Temple Alley
    Temple Alley
  • Corner Pavilion by Louis Remy de la Fosse
    Corner Pavilion by Louis Remy de la Fosse
  • Detail of a broderie
    Detail of a
    broderie
  • Fireworks in the Great Garden
    Fireworks in the Great Garden
  • A statue in the Herrenhausen Gardens
    A statue in the Herrenhausen Gardens

Hill Garden

Main article: Hill Garden
Library building in the Hill Garden

The Hill Garden was established in 1666 as a vegetable garden for the Great Garden on a hill north of the Herrenhäuser Castle. Sophia of Hanover later transformed the Hill Garden into a garden for exotic plants, and in 1686 a conservatory was erected.

The garden once served more than an aesthetic purpose; it was used to experiment with the breeding in the northern climate of Lower Saxony of plants normally native to southern lands. While this experiment failed in its attempts to grow

silkworms located in the nearby city of Hamelin that were used in the production of royal silk began to be fed with Herrenhäuser mulberry leaves in 1706. However, this experiment did not pay off long-term: in 1750 the Kitchen Garden (Küchengarten) in the neighbouring city of Linden
(now a district of the City of Hanover) took over the job of supporting the aristocracy with produce, and the Hill Garden has since been exclusively a botanical garden.

Between 1817 and 1820, a

palm trees
. Within five years of its completion in 1849, the building housed the most valuable and extensive collection of palms in all of Europe.

King George I of Great Britain
, Elector of Hanover

Work on the garden's

Charlottenburg Palace served as a model. A U-shaped grove of pedunculate oaks dating back to the 18th century was planted around the mausoleum. The architect Georg Schuster  [de
] succeeded in transplanting 36 oak trees, which were already 60 years old at the time, without causing any major damage to the trees.

It was also around this time (1845 to 1846) that walls and fences were added in order to make the Hill Garden more secluded. In 1880, a larger building for the palm collection was built. Taking the form of a roughly 30-metre-tall (98 ft) palace-like structure, the greenhouse, built out of glass and steel, houses both galleries and decorative

Princess Viktoria Luise of Prussia
who died in 1980.

The year 2000 saw the completion of a brand new

Expo 2000. It houses a tropical landscape
containing plants and various species of tropical butterflies and birds that were incorporated into the environment. Further exhibits of the building include several themed gardens.

Georgen Garden

Main article: Georgen Garden
Leibniz Temple in the Georgen Garden

Guelf Garden

Guelf Castle (Welfenschloss), the central point of Guelf Garden (Welfengarten), c. 1895
Prince House (Fürstenhaus)

University of Hannover, and the main building of the university is the gothic revival Guelf Castle (Welfenschloss) at the centre of the garden. Construction began in 1857, however in 1866 Prussia annexed Hanover before the building was completed in the following years. In front of the building, which has maintained its form to the present, is a bronze sculpture of the Lower Saxony Steed (Niedersachsenross) – the heraldic animal found on the coat of arms
of Lower Saxony. Guelf Garden, like the other gardens, was destroyed during the Second World War, but it was rebuilt specifically as the campus of the university.

Although the university has been resident in the building since 1879, it was not until 1961, after both

Ernest Augustus sold Guelf Garden to the City of Hanover while retaining ownership of the 'Prince House' (Fürstenhaus), located near the Great Garden. Built by King George I of Great Britain for his daughter Anna Louise in 1720, as of 2023 that building is used by his grandson Ernst August
as his private residence. The museum in this small palace, with an elaborate furniture collection, is closed.

See also

References

  1. OCLC 1752319
    .
  2. ^ a b c Bennis, Ed (4 September 2015). Laudation by Ed Bennis, Manchester (PDF) (Speech). European Garden Award 2015. Hamburg. Retrieved 29 October 2023. The Great Garden [...] was regrettably destroyed during the war, despite pleas from the British royal family to the RAF.
  3. ^ Bekker, Henk (28 August 2020). "Visit the Baroque Herrenhausen Gardens in Hannover, Germany". European Traveler. Retrieved 29 October 2023. Despite winning the first battle, Hannover was forced to surrender, and the kingdom became the Prussian province of Hannover.
  4. ^ "Germany Holidays: The House of Hanover". Germany is Wunderbar!. 12 October 2010. Retrieved 29 October 2023. Hanover's rather bland modern appearance is a result of a lethal makeover by the RAF during World War II. The redesign gurus at Bomber Command barely gave a passing thought to the fact that this north German city shares some of our history, thanks to the House of Hanover.
  5. ^ "Campaign Diary October 1943". Royal Air Force Bomber Command 60th Anniversary. 6 April 2005. Retrieved 13 November 2022.
  6. ^ Cook, William (12 May 2014). "Hanover: By George! This is a German gem". Independent. Retrieved 29 October 2023. Herrenhausen [...] was the rural retreat of our Georges, a sort of Hanoverian Versailles. Destroyed by British bombers in 1943, it's been beautifully rebuilt. [...] George I is buried here, the only English king since William the Conqueror buried outside England.
  7. ^ Hawkson (18 October 2018). "Hannovers Regal Past". Travellerspoint. Retrieved 29 October 2023.
  8. ^ Badelt, Udo (21 January 2013). "Schloss Herrenhausen in Hannover". Tagesspiegel (in German). Retrieved 29 October 2023. Hannover, die graue Maus unter den deutschen Großstädten, weckt auf fast unheimliche Weise keinerlei Assoziationen. Nicht mal einen kernigen Dialekt spricht man hier. [...] Wer in Hannover lebt, muss Spott ertragen können
  9. ^ Gerfen, Katie. "Schloss Herrenhausen, Designed by Jastrzembski Kotulla Architekten". Architect Magazine. Zonda Media. Retrieved 29 October 2023.
  10. ^ Stark, Florian (18 January 2013). "Schloss Herrenhausen – auferstanden aus Ruinen". Welt (in German). Axel Springer Deutschland. Retrieved 29 October 2023. 2007 wurden die ersten Beschlüsse gefasst, danach erfolgte eine europaweite Ausschreibung. [...] 2010 begannen die Bauarbeiten.
  11. ^ "Herrenhausen Palace and Museum". Visit Hannover. Hannover Marketing & Tourismus. 2023. Retrieved 29 October 2023. The opening of the Palace on 18 January 2013 ended decades of debate about whether to rebuild it.
  12. ISSN 0140-0460
    . Retrieved 22 October 2023.

External links

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52°23′30″N 9°41′54″E / 52.39167°N 9.69833°E / 52.39167; 9.69833

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