Herrenhausen Gardens
Herrenhäuser Gärten
Interesting facts
- The original Great Fountain was based on ideas of the philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and was first set going in 1719 during a visit by George I.
- The British royal family asked the Royal Air Force to spare the palace, still owned by the House of Hanover, but a 1943 air raid hit it anyway.
- The outside staircase of the old palace was salvaged from the ruins and now stands beside the Orangery building.
- George III had the palace remodelled in Neoclassical style by Georg Ludwig Friedrich Laves, even though he never once visited Herrenhausen.
- In the neighbouring Berggarten, attempts to grow rice failed, but mulberries thrived, and from 1706 their leaves fed the silkworms of the royal silk works in Hamelin.
- Within five years of its completion in 1849, the Berggarten's Palm House held what was considered the most valuable palm collection in Europe.
- Around the royal mausoleum in the Berggarten, 36 oak trees that were already about 60 years old were transplanted without serious damage.
- After wartime bombing destroyed the Leine Palace and its chapel, the remains of George I and his parents were reburied in the Berggarten mausoleum.
- The Low German Rose Garden within the Great Garden grows around 650 rose varieties, including local cultivars named Kurfürstin Sophie and King George.
- In 2016 Chancellor Angela Merkel welcomed President Barack Obama with military honours in the Great Garden.
Why it is worth it
The Great Garden at Herrenhausen is one of the most complete Baroque gardens in Europe: some fifty hectares of clipped hedges, geometric parterres, statues and water, laid out in strict symmetry and framed on three sides by a moat. At its centre the Great Fountain throws a jet that can reach around 80 metres under good conditions; already in the early eighteenth century, when it was first set going, it rose to about 35 metres and was the tallest fountain at any European court. Hedged garden rooms, a hedge theatre from the 1690s and triple rows of lime trees complete the picture of a princely pleasure ground built to impress.
The garden owes its form to Electress Sophia of Hanover, who from 1683 had the French gardener Martin Charbonnier enlarge an older kitchen garden into the formal plan that survives today. Her son became King George I of Great Britain in 1714, and for more than a century the Electors of Hanover also wore the British crown, which made Herrenhausen the summer seat of a dynasty that ruled two countries. The palace itself was wrecked by bombing in 1943 and largely cleared after the war; it was rebuilt behind its historic facade and since January 2013 it has served as a museum and conference venue. Between 2001 and 2003 the French-American artist Niki de Saint Phalle transformed one of the garden's grottoes, covering its walls with glass, mirrors, minerals and shells.
The Great Garden is one of four that together make up the Herrenhausen Gardens. Opposite lies the Berggarten, today a botanical garden; to the east the Georgengarten and the Welfengarten are laid out in the freer English landscape style, a counterpoint to the Baroque geometry next door. Hanover, the capital of Lower Saxony, was heavily damaged in the Second World War and rebuilt largely in a modern form, which makes this preserved court landscape on its northwestern side all the more striking.
Getting there
The gardens are in the Herrenhausen district of Hanover, next to the Nordstadt district, about 1.5 km away, on the northwestern side of the city. The nearest airport is Hannover Airport (HAJ), about 8 km away.
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From the encyclopaedia
The Herrenhausen Gardens of Herrenhausen Palace are located in Herrenhausen, an urban district of Hanover, the capital of Lower Saxony, Germany. Dating to the era of the prince-electors of Hanover and kings of Hanover, they comprise Great Garden, Hill Garden, Georgen Garden and Guelf Garden.
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