Baroque Palace Mannheim (Germany, 21-2-2008)

Rating:	★★★★★
Category:	Other

Mannheim is not a city that will be on many people's list of places to visit in Germany but maybe it should be. So why should you check out Mannheim?

1) Take a look at the map: here.
Noticed anything odd? Indeed, the inner city has a chessboard-pattern and no street names! Our hotel was in F4 ;-)

2) Interesting architecture: several churches and other buildings with interesting styles.

3) Fun museums with great exhibits. See the other review for one of them.

4) A really big Baroque palace! Site here

The palace was built between 1720 and 1760. Mozart played at the Mannheim court which was a leading centre of culture at this time.
Napoleon's adoptive daughter Stéphanie (Grand Duchess of Baden by marriage) used to live here un till her death in 1860. She had parts of the palace renovated in Empire style (see pic).
Sadly a lot of this magnificent palace was destroyed during WWII. But luckily enough was spared and the rebuilding started in 1953. Parts are now used for the university.
Now there was a palace but the objects which had adorned the many rooms were almost all gone. In 1995 a project was started to restore the original splendour of several important rooms. And the palace re-opened in 2007!

The part of the palace which you can visit is really stunning! It's like walking inside a historical movie about Mozart or Napoleon, depending on which room you are in.
There's an interesting audio-tour which explains everything you'd like to know (in English!).
It's a pity that none of the gardens survived (there are roads there now) but the palace is a great place to be!

Check out Mannheim at their (German) site: http://www.mannheim.de/