Page 204 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Hungary

202  HUNGAR Y REGION B Y REGION SOUTHERN TR ANSD ANUBIA  203

Festetics Palace and Helikon Palace Museum . Mirror Room VISITORS’ CHECKLIST
The ornate Mirror
Originally the home of the Festetics family, the . Baroque Tower Room, also known Practical Information
as the Main Hall,
stately, Neo-Baroque Festetics Palace dates in its The tower was inspired regularly hosts Kastély utca 1, Keszthely. Road
Map B4. Tel (83) 31 21 90.
earliest parts to 1745; the final phase of building, by the Zwinger in chamber music n Tourinform, Kossuth utca 30,
by little-known architect Viktor Rumpelmayer, Dresden, Germany, concerts and (83) 31 41 44. Open May, Jun &
while the northern
dates to 1883–7. The family was forced to flee in wing (left of the tower operettas. Sep: 10am– 5pm daily; Jul & Aug:
9am–6pm daily; Oct–Apr: 10am–
1944, after which the palace was occupied by the here) was based on 5pm Tue–Sun. & 8 7 - =
German Army, then the Soviets; it was opened as Vienna’s Belvedere. charge for photography and use
of video ca meras. ∑ helikon
a museum in 1974. About a quarter of the palace’s kastely.hu
101 rooms are open to the public, and feature fine Transport
art, furniture and memorabilia from the Festetics £ @ 4
Main
family. Adjacent buildings house a superb model entrance
railway, an exhibition of weaponry and hunting
trophies and a carriage museum. The palace is also
famous for its extensive library and its magnificent
English-style gardens.

Chapel
. English Gardens The small, private Festetics
English – not French – Chapel was built in 1801,
stately homes were the remaining unchanged by the
inspiration for the palace enlargements of the 1880s.
gardens. They were laid out
by the English landscape
artist Henry Ernest Miller.

Portrait Gallery
Portraits of almost
every member of
the Festetics family,
Croatian in origin,
as well as of related . Library
European nobility, The panelled Helikon Library holds over 80,000
line the walls of volumes on its oak shelves. Hungary’s literary
. Palm House the palace. elite gathered here in György Festetics’s time.
The Palm House was built in 1880 using
structural elements made in Paris by
Gustave Eiffel. It was reopened in 2012
and exhibits rare exotic flow ers and plants
from the Mediterranean and the trop ics,
as well as a bird park that opened in 2016. György Festetics
A polymath who combined a love of the land and the arts with the
KEY progressive ideals of the Enlightenment, György Festetics (1755–1819)
Carriage Museum was the grandson of Kristóf Festetics, who purchased the lands for the
1 Rounded Belvedere-style In the palace’s former stables, family estate here in 1739. György Festetics is best known for founding
Tower of Northern Wing the Carriage Museum is home the Georgikon at Keszthely in 1797 (see p200), Europe’s first agricultural college.
2 Rooms are each decorated in to a priceless collection of A generous patron of the arts, he organized cultural events including poetry
and music festivals at the palace. He substantially expanded the palace’s
a different colour scheme and hunting and parade coaches, library, employing librarians and bookbinders to curate his literary treasures. Statue of György
fully furnished. carriages and sleighs from the Festetics
18th and 19th centuries.
For hotels and restaurants see pp264–269 and pp276–285

202-203_EW_Hungary.indd 202 18/09/17 3:37 pm 202-203_EW_Hungary.indd 203 18/09/17 3:37 pm