Ludwigslust Palace(German:Schloss Ludwigslust) is a stately home orschlossin the town ofLudwigslust,Mecklenburg-Vorpommern,northernGermany.It was built as a hunting lodge and rebuilt as a retreat from the ducal capital,Schwerin,then became from 1765 to 1837 the center of government. It was thejoyofPrince Christian Ludwig,the heir of theDuke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin,hence the nameLudwigslust.
Origins
editLudwigslust had its origins in a simple hunting lodge within a day's ride (36 km) of the ducal capital,Schwerin.In 1724,Prince Christian Ludwig,the heir of theDuke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin,decided to build a hunting lodge on this site, near a hamlet called Klenow. Even after he became the reigning duke in his turn in 1747, he passed most of his time at this residence, which he calledLudwigslust( "Ludwig's joy" ).
Residence
editIn 1765,Frederick II, Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerinmade Ludwigslust the capital of the duchy instead of Schwerin. Consequently, the little town that had already grown in the service of theschlosswas further expanded, and a cornerstone for a new, granderresidenzwas laid directly behind the old hunting box in 1768.[1]In the years 1772–1776, Ludwigslust was rebuilt to plans byJohann Joachim Busch.TheLate Baroqueschlossis built on an E-plan foundation, with a higher projecting centralcorps de logisin three bays, which appears to penetrate its wings from front to rear; the richerCorinthian orderof the central block contrasts with theIonicof the wings. On the urban side, the central block makes some compromises with the newneoclassical stylein the flat planes of the façade, which simply occupies one flank of the square centered on it, without embracing the space in acour d'honneur(illustration, below left) and in the severeDoric portico.The structure is brick, clad in the local sandstone; forty over-lifesize allegorical figures, also in sandstone, by Rudolf Kaplunger, alternating with vases, crown the low attic above the cornice.[2]
The interiors of Ludwigslust are more fully neoclassical. The grand reception rooms are on thepiano nobile,orFestetage( "Reception floor" ), above a low ground floor that contained guestrooms. TheGoldener Saal( "Gilded Hall" ) in the central block rises through two storeys, with a colossal order of Corinthian columns and massive decorations carried out in stucco and the innovative moldable and modelablepaper-machécalledLudwigsluster Carton;it is used today for summertime concerts. One flanking range was semi-public, with a sequence of antechamber, salon and audience chamber, and a gallery. The opposite range was semi-private, with the Duke's drawing-room and bedchamber (hung with framed miniatures), a cabinet and a gallery with a porcelain chimneypiece.
Theschlosswas the center-point of a range of grand buildings sited in deference to it, including theHofkirchethat served as the court chapel. A central avenue through the town was laid out, centered on theschloss;on the garden side, the axis was carried through as theHofdamenallee( "Court ladies'allée"), a central ride through the enclosing woodland, still reaching the slightly elevated wooded horizon today.
The palace's surroundingSchlossparkof 120 ha. was laid out with formal canals, fountains and a frankly artificial cascade, tamed of all the wildness that a later,Romantic generationwould venerate; it was built according to sketches by the French architectJean-Laurent Le Geay,who had laid out the formal garden at Schwerin in 1749–55, but was quickly overtaken at Ludwigslust by his assistant,Johann Joachim Busch,who began the work in 1763.[3]The trees laid out in the pattern and at the scale of Bernini's colonnades inPiazza San Pietrohave disappeared, but there are the neoclassical stone bridge designed by Busch about 1780, with a cascade that falls across a lip so perfectly regular that it has the nameDer Waltze(the "Roll" ), agrottobuilt as aruin,a Gothic chapel, two mausoleums[4]and a monument to a favourite horse.[5]
In 1837, Grand DukePaul Friedrichreturned Schwerin to its capital status. As a summer residence, Schloss Ludwigslust was preserved from further alterations. In the mid-nineteenth century, much of the park was re-landscaped in the more naturalisticEnglish landscape gardenmanner, under the direction of a garden designer with an extensive clientele among the German aristocracy,Peter Joseph Lenné.[6]Water near the schloss was recast in more naturalistic manner and the surrounding woodland edges were varied, with clumps of trees as outliers, but the main axiaHofdamenalleecentered on the palace, still stretches dead straight through the woods, and the narrow Great Canal, laid out at an angle to one side, still extends a kilometer and a half.
The deposed Mecklenburg-Schwerin family continued to use Ludwigslust until 1945. Today, it houses theStaatliches Museum Schwerin/Ludwigslust/Güstrow(the "State Museum of Schwerin/Ludwigslust/Güstrow" ), with a collection of paintings byJean-Baptiste Oudryand busts byJean Antoine Houdon[8]that represent the tastes of the Mecklenburg dukes.
In 1844,William Makepeace Thackerayset a high-living episode of his amoral eighteenth-century heroBarry Lyndonat Ludwigslust, where Barry, pursuing a countess, is accompanied by a black page named Zamor who is dressed in Turkish attire, and his pavilion is "fitted up in the Eastern manner, very splendid.[9]
See also
editNotes
edit- ^"Staatlichen Museum Schwerin website".Archived fromthe originalon 2007-04-11.Retrieved2007-10-16.
- ^Capitals and swags and other decorative sculpture of the exterior were provided by Martin Satorius. (Staatlichen Museum Schwerin websiteArchived2007-04-11 at theWayback Machine).
- ^Gilbert Erouard,L'architecture au pinceau: Un Piranésien français dans l'Europe des lumières
- ^One is that of the Duchess Luise (died 1808), by court architect J.G. Barca.. The other byJoseph Ramée(Paul V. Turner,Joseph Ramée: International Architect of the Revolutionary Era1996) is that ofElena Pavlovna,Grand Duchess of Russia, who became the consort of Hereditary Prince Friedrich Ludwig of Mecklenburg-Schwerin (1778–1819), but died suddenly and prematurely at Ludwigslust in 1803, having given birth there to an heir,Paul Frederick, Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin,who moved the court back to Schwerin upon his accession in 1837.
- ^Gordon McLachlan,The Rough Guide to Germany2004:718.
- ^GardenGuide:Schloss LudwigslustArchived2007-11-02 at theWayback Machine;Ludwigslust Palace Garden,official brochure
- ^Its architect wasJohann Christoph Heinrich von Seydewitz.
- ^On a trip to Paris in the winter of 1782, Duke Friedrich Franz and his duchess commissioned portrait busts from Houdon; doubtless they also purchased the fifteen Houdon busts in terracotta-colored plaster now at Ludwigslust. (Anne L. Poulet,Jean-Antoine Houdon: Sculptor of the Enlightenment[National Gallery of Art exhibition] 2003:45f)
- ^The history of European infatuation with pseudo-Turkish themes can be pursued at the articleTurquerie.
External links
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