Hluboká Castle

Rising above the woods and the Vltava valley north of České Budějovice, Hluboká looks less like a Bohemian castle than a piece of Victorian England set down in South Bohemia. The rock has been fortified since the second half of the thirteenth century, when a Gothic royal castle stood here, and it was rebuilt several times for its later lords before the Schwarzenberg family acquired it in 1661. What we see today, though, is the work of one man's enthusiasm. Prince Johann Adolf II of Schwarzenberg attended the coronation of Queen Victoria in 1838, came home captivated by English Gothic, and resolved to remake his seat on the model of Windsor Castle.

The architect Franz Beer drew the plans in 1839 and ran the building site from 1840 until his death, and Franz Damasus Deworetzky finished the work by 1871. The result is one of the finest Romantic Neo-Gothic buildings in Central Europe: crenellated towers, pinnacles, oriel windows and battlements in a Tudor manner, set around courtyards on the edge of a steep drop. Inside, the Schwarzenbergs spared nothing. Walls and ceilings are panelled and carved in wood, hung with leather, textiles and Brussels tapestries; the library with its coffered ceiling, the armoury, the dining halls and salons and the Neo-Gothic chapel with a late-Gothic altar are all kept with their original furnishings. The family owned the castle until it was confiscated during the war and then passed to the state, which spared it the dispersal suffered by many noble houses.

For a view over the whole setting, the main tower can be climbed: 245 steps lead 52 metres above the courtyard, looking out over the English-style landscape park, the surrounding forests and fields, and the town of Hluboká nad Vltavou below. The former riding hall now houses part of the Aleš South Bohemian Gallery, with Dutch and Flemish painting of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and the winter garden and park make the grounds worth a long walk even without going inside.

Getting there

Hluboká nad Vltavou is about 9 km north of České Budějovice. The small České Budějovice South Bohemian Airport (JCL) is about 12 km away; Prague (PRG) is the main international airport. Local buses run from České Budějovice to Hluboká nad Vltavou, and the castle stands above the town, a short climb from the centre; the visitor car park is about 750 metres from the castle.