City of Palaces and Gardens

Extensive landscape of castles, palaces and sprawling parks are the main attraction for palatial Potsdam. From the 17th through 20th centuries, Prussian kings commissioned the best artists of their time to build elaborate palaces and gardens in Potsdam, a center of Prussia and home of the royal residence. In the 19th century, renowned landscape architect Peter Joseph Lenné unified these riches into such a harmonious landscape that UNESCO placed it on the list of World Heritage sites in 1991.

For most visitors, it is the Park Sanssouci (Sanssouci Gardens) that is the prime attraction. It covers 724 acres – compared to Central Park’s 840 – and has three palaces: Schloss Sanssouci (Sanssouci Palace), the Neues Palais (New Palace) and Schloss Charlottenhof (Charlottenhof Palace). Many visitors to the "Park Sanssouci" (Sanssouci Gardens) neglect the smaller but exquisite "Neuer Garten" (New Garden), with two charming palaces: the Marmorpalast (Marble Palace) and Schloss Cecilienhof (Cecilienhof Palace), built in 1917 in the style of an English country estate. Although Cecilienhof is the youngest of the Hohenzollern palaces, it carries perhaps the greatest direct significance for Americans and modern Europe. It was here that the victorious powers of World War II met from June 17 to August 2, 1945, for the Potsdam Conference.

Be sure to set aside some time to walk around the Baroque Old Town, especially the Holländerviertel (Dutch Quarter) with its gabled brick houses and the Brandenburgerstrasse (Brandenburg Street), a pedestrian shopping boulevard lined with antique stores and shops. Gain some of the best views of the parks and palaces from the lakes and river. Relaxing cruises are available of different lengths and routes.

"Schloss Cecilienhof" (Cecilienhof Palace), built in the "Neuer Garten" (New Garden) from 1914-1917, was the last royal contribution to Potsdam's cultural landscape. The 180-room English country house-style palace was the setting for the 1945 Potsdam Conference.

"Schloss Cecilienhof" was designed in style of an English country house for Crown Prince William, eldest son of Kaiser Wilhelm II, and Crown Princess Cecilie. Construction started in 1914, and the building was completed in 1917.

The palace's design was largely inspired by neo-Tudor style, with exposed brickwork, half-timbering and decorative chimney stacks. The mansion, with nearly 180 rooms, was designed to be occupied year-round. Its most distinctive features are its courtyards, including the "Ehrenhof" (Honor Court) with its carriage entrance reserved for the imperial couple.

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The small "Schloss Charlottenhof" (Charlottenhof Palace) and the park area around it is an outstanding example of romantic classicism in Germany, an artistic entity of buildings, gardens and landscape park. Before 1825, the area that became the grounds of the "Schloss Charlottenhof" was covered by an agricultural estate. When it became the property of the crown prince, later the "romantic king" Friedrich Wilhelm IV, he developed plans to transform it and add it to the existing park of Sanssouci. He found congenial assistants in the famed architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel and landscape architect Peter Joseph Lenné.

From 1826-1929, the former manor was transformed into a small palace of bourgeois proportions resembling a Roman villa reflecting in its plain interior the spirit of Biedermeier. An artificial terrace, a pond and a garden were added. The former agricultural and garden land was transformed into an English-style landscape park with broad areas of lawn, with groups of trees and artificial pools, opening up various axes of view to the "Neues Palais" (New Palace) and other buildings and sculptures of the gardens of Sanssouci.

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The Baroque "Holländerviertel" (Dutch Quarter), a group of red-brick, gabled houses, was built from 1735-1742 to attract much-needed craftsmen from Holland. The Dutch were recognized as experts in building on swamps, and that's what much of Potsdam was at the time.

The Dutch also provided skills as cabinet-makers, goldsmiths and masons. Built in Dutch tongue-and-groove, half-timber construction style, the houses fill a four-block district once derelict and at risk of being torn down, but now filled with courtyard restaurants, cafés and pubs.

The Jan Bouman Museum at Mittelstrasse 9 gives visitors an excellent sense of what the houses looked like both before and after restoration.

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The "Einsteinturm" (Einstein Tower) is the first important building designed by the famous architect Erich Mendelsohn. It was planned and built in the years 1919 to 1924, the main part was finished in 1921. One may argue whether it makes sense to define the building in terms of architectural style. The tower is often called the "main example for architectural expressionism". Its general design is very harmonic, however, and Mendelsohn's own perception oppose was different. In this aspect, everybody has to find his own answer.

Unusual are also the other parameters of the building's past: The Einstein tower is a functional building, a solar observatory and until the second World War the most prominent research institution of that kind in Europe. The tower is therefore also an example for the very few connections between science and art, as Mendelsohn fulfilled the conditions for the scientific use as well as his own concepts of form. Due to Mendelsohn's interest in Einstein's work, some of the spirit of the exciting developments in modern physics is also captured in the building.

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The building complex of the "Neues Palais" (New Palace) is the last and most impressive baroque monument of the Prussian kings, built in part as a boastful response to the palace of Versailles of the French kings.

The construction of the "Neues Palais" (New Palace) after the end of the Seven Years' War was meant to demonstrate Prussia's success and self-confidence relative to the palace of Versailles of the French kings. The "Neues Palais" was built 1763-1769 and is nearly 700 feet long with three stories crowned with a majestic cupola and decorated with 428 large sculptures. It comprises more than 200 rooms, spacious living quarters and representative rooms for royal functions, among them the grotto hall, richly decorated with shells and semiprecious stones, the marble hall and the small theater.

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The "Park Sanssouci" (Sanssouci Gardens) covers 724 acres - compared to Central Park's 840 - and has three palaces: the rococo "Schloss Sanssouci" (Sanssouci Palace), the Baroque "Neues Palais" (New Palace) and "Schloss Charlottenhof" (Charlottenhof Palace).

In its entirety, Sanssouci presents an ensemble of palaces and gardens that form the centerpiece of Potsdam's unique cultural and historical landscape.

During the 18th and 19th centuries, the Prussian kings and later German emperors of the house of Hohenzollern transformed the natural Havel landscape of sandy hills, pine forests, rivers and lakes into an outstanding cultural landscape, an ensemble of palaces of various styles and parks of various kinds.

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The "Schloss Sanssouci" (Sanssouci Palace) is the most popular of Potsdam's palaces, a charming rococo masterpiece set atop a hill overlooking the Havel landscape.

A king who joined his troops on the battlefield, Frederick the Great commissioned "Schloss Sanssouci" in 1747 as a summer palace where he could have a respite from battle sans souci - without worry. You can see his fatigue in the many statues: the warrior in marble, his sword in its sheath, his shield down, a look of weariness on his face.

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The "Brandenburgerstrasse" (Brandenburg Street), a restored 18th-century residential area, has been transformed into a wide pedestrian boulevard filled with eclectic book stores, antique shops and bistros.

In 1713, the "Soldier King," Frederick William I, launched a new era for Potsdam by bringing military units into town. At the time, it was not common practice to lodge soldiers in garrisons. Therefore, the king had medieval Potsdam torn down and built a new residential district, "Brandenburgerstrasse", to house both families and Prussian troops - as many as six soldiers to a household.

Today, Brandenburg and neighboring streets have been transformed into wide pedestrian boulevards filled with smiling shoppers and gawkers, and many of the houses into eclectic book stores, antique shops and bistros.