Palais Lichtenau

Palais Lichtenau stands in Potsdam, an early classical building raised between 1796 and 1797 under King Friedrich Wilhelm II. The king bought the land in May 1790, one of several purchases made during the expansion of the New Garden. The plot lay outside the park grounds, bordered to the north and east by the Behlertstraße.

Work began in early summer 1796 under Michael Philipp Boumann's supervision. The roof followed by September, the interiors by spring 1797. Whether Boumann or Carl Gotthard Langhans drew up the design remains an open question. A popular story ties the house to Countess Wilhelmine von Lichtenau, yet she probably never lived there. The inauguration came on 25 September 1797, amid the dissolution of the marriage between Johann Friedrich Ritz and the king's mistress. The king had demanded that break himself in April 1796. A principal floor on a high base carries a mansard roof, and the four facades all differ. The northeast side towards the Behlertstraße serves as the main public view, marked by a three-axis central risalit under a triangular pediment. The pediment holds a relief by Johann Gottfried Schadow.

Inside, the original layout survives, and some rooms still carry their high-quality first finishes. The garden side opens through a central garden hall into a corridor with two arcades, which links the various rooms. Notable among them are the Rosewood Room with its wood panelling and the Oval Cabinet with its singular wall decoration. The vaulted rooms of the basement probably served plain practical purposes. The Festsaal runs the whole depth of the house on the southeast side, its symmetric ornament borrowed from ancient reliefs.