Babelsberg Palace

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  View of Babelsberg Park with Babelsberg Palace.

• View of Babelsberg Palace with surrounding terraces, fountains, water features and flower beds.

• Tourists walk across the Voltaire Terrace at Babelsberg Palace.

• The ceiling of the large dance hall in Babelsberg Palace in Potsdam.

• A man goes for a walk in Babelsberg Park by the snow-covered Babelsberg Palace.

Babelsberg Palace and Babelsberg Park on the border between Berlin and Potsdam are a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Once the summer residence of Emperor William I, they are now a popular excursion destination.

Babelsberg Palace rises majestically above the banks of the Havel on the border between Berlin and Potsdam. The palace in the English neo-Gothic style served Prince William of Prussia - later Emperor William I - and his wife as a summer residence for more than fifty years. The extensive park surrounding the palace, designed by Peter Joseph Lenné and completed by Prince Pückler, also dates from this period.

From cottage to prestigious palace

Babelsberg Palace and Babelsberg Park were built and designed from 1833 for Prince William of Prussia and his wife Augusta from the House of Saxe-Weimar. The first palace building, designed by Karl Friedrich Schinkel, was only the size of a small cottage. With the appointment of the heir to the throne in 1840, it was extended into a palace under the aegis of the architects Ludwig Persius and Johann Heinrich Strack until 1849 and took on its present form. This also led to differences of opinion with the builders. Princess Augusta in particular had very clear ideas about how the palace should look.

English Gothic revival style in Babelsberg

With its lancet windows, pointed arches, polygonal turrets and bay windows, Babelsberg Palace is built in the English Gothic style, but also contains clear reminiscences of the castle style and the Middle Ages. The large, floor-to-ceiling pointed arch windows of the octagonal tea room and the dance hall offer many views of the extensive park and the surrounding landscape. Between the 1860s and 188s, Babelsberg was one of the most important places in Prussian social and political life.

A walk through Babelsberg Park

The landscaped palace park, designed on hilly terrain, offers sweeping views across the Havel - for example of Glienicke Bridge and Glienicke Palace Park on the other bank of the Havel. The park comprises alternately planted garden terraces, a pleasure ground with water features, flower gardens and ornamental shrubs as well as wooded areas criss-crossed by numerous walking paths. An artificial water system not only feeds the water features, but also streams, waterfalls and artificial lakes.

Information

• Address:
  Park Babelsberg 10
  14482 Potsdam
  City map

Getting to Babelsberg Palace

By train: From Babelsberg S-Bahn station, take the bus in the direction of Griebnitzsee to the Babelsberg Palace stop. From the Babelsberg Palace stop or the parking lot, walk approximately 600 meters to the palace. As the number of parking spaces is very limited, we recommend traveling by public transport.

By car: If you start in Berlin, you can approach Babelsberg Palace from Steglitz and Zehlendorf via Potsdamer Chaussee and Königstraße.