Palais du Rhin

The Palais du Rhin (English: Palace of the Rhine ), formerly Imperial Palace, on the Place de la Republique in Strasbourg, was built in 1884-1889 and is one of the most striking buildings in the city. The entire line is one of the most complete products German Monumental architecture of the late 19th century dar.

Location

The heavy, dominated by a pickelhaube -like domed building is surrounded by a spacious garden with a high wrought -iron lattice. The main facade completes the vast Place de la République (former " imperial court "), which of the other powerful government buildings (former parliament of Alsace- Lorraine, today Théâtre national de Strasbourg, former kingdom of Land Management, today Préfecture du Bas- Rhin) is lined. The former stables (built 1885) is located behind the palace, at the corner of Rue du Maréchal Foch today and Rue du Général Brother. The building only partially obtained is characterized by a horse's head above the main portal.

History

The Imperial Palace was built as a palace for the emperor of the German Empire and as a testimony of the permanent annexation of Alsace-Lorraine and the country on the occasion of the 87th Birthday of Wilhelm I on March 22, 1884 by the architect Hermann Eggert ( 1844-1920 ) started. The reason for its exorbitant cost (3 million gold marks ) and his pompous Neorenaissancestils ( vaguely modeled on the Palazzo Pitti ) heavily criticized construction was completed in 1889 and inaugurated in the same year by William II. This was within the follow- up to 1914 at least once a year in the building on, but without to appreciate its architecture especially ( it was nicknamed 'the elephant stable "because it is said to have reminded him of the elephant house of the zoo in Berlin's Tiergarten ).

During the First World War, the building was used as a military hospital. In 1920 it became the seat of the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine and received its new name. 1940, the palace was the seat of the headquarters of the National Socialist local government, then from November 1944 to the headquarters of the city liberator, General Philippe de Hauteclocque ( Leclerc ). In the wake of the British and U.S. bombing of the city in August 1944, the palace was badly damaged.

Nowadays, both externally and internally meticulously restored building next to ZKRS the Alsatian Direction régional des Affaires culturelles (DRAC ).

2008, the palace served as the backdrop for the filming of the French television miniseries La Résistance. To this end, the Paris Gestapo headquarters was in it ( originally the Hôtel Lutetia ) readjusted.