If you follow German news of the past month or so.....the Bellevue Palace gets brought up a good bit. It's the present residence of the President of Germany (not the Chancellor)....Steinmier. A good number of these coalition-building conversations have occurred, and the news folks often place themselves in front of the Palace for their nightly coverage.
The Palace was originally built in 1786 (taking roughly 18 month to complete), and was for Prince Ferdinand of Prussia, the brother of the King.
The occupants of the Palace shifted around for decades, and eventually in 1928, it became a museum....owned and operated by the state authorities. In the 1938 period, the Nazis took over ownership, and made it into a guest-house facility for visitors.
It was fairly damaged during WW II, and renovated after the war. In 1959, they flipped the use of the Palace once again....over to a second 'home' for the President of Germany (Heuss, at that time). In the late 1980s....it went through another renovation. After the Wall came down.....yet another renovation occurred. About twelve years ago.....another renovation occurred.
At some point about eight years ago, they made the decision that it was a fine building for official functions, but simply didn't work as a residence for people. So a second property....about ten kilometers away in Dahlem, Germany was worked up as the President's residence.
As for the location? It's a stone's throw from the Spree River....just north of Tiergarten area....about as center to the city of Berlin as you can get.
Visitors? You can get a tour of the Palace and the gardens (I've yet to do the walk). With a ton of stuff to see in Berlin....I'd probably rate this in the top forty things but it probably wouldn't make the top ten list.
No comments:
Post a Comment