rheinsberg | Sanssouci in Autumn

First of all, I encourage anyone who hasn't seen any pictures of Sanssouci before to check out my Sanssouci in Summer pic spam first, both because there's far more to see, and because that's what it was designed for, being a summer residence; our antihero spent the winter months in Berlin. However, having been there recently, I could not resist and walked the palace grounds in mid November.

The sole two palaces which are still open to the public this late in the year are the main one and the "New Palace"; the other buildings in the park you can only see from the outside, and most of the statues have been barricaded to protect them against the winter already. However, on this visit I had a very special greeting: :)

(Yes, I gave him money. I mean, if the man is dedicated enough to play on a cold and windy November morning...

Anyway: This is the "Neues Palais", the New Palace, the last building added in Frederick's life time, when the Rococo style he favored was already going out of fashion but he defiantly built it in this style anyway. It was the post 7 Years War show-off palace, for guests, and full of Silesian marble.

Near the New Palace is the "Pavillon of Friendship" dedicated to Wilhelmine's memory. The statue showing Wilhelmine and her favorite dog, Folichon, is already safely hidden behind wood, but from a distance, the temple looks great surrounded by fall leaves:

A bit further on in the park, there's the Chinese Pavillon where Fritz met with one of his few surviving friends, George Keith, Earl Marischal, for tea in their old age, Keith living on the other side of the park and not up to climbing the hill of the central palace anymore.

Something I didn't see when I was there last year in summer because it was busy getting renovated: the Orangerie palace, a post-Frederick addition, currently hosting the delicate plants:

The original building for the plants was the one now known as the "New Chambres", the "Neue Kammern", which was the first building Frederick repurposed to put his guests in, before building the New Palace. Directly behind the New Chambres is the famous Mill. (Reconstructed, btw; the original did not survive WWII.)

The New Chambers:

Behind Sanssouci, you can see one of the fake ruins 18th and 19th century loved to plant inside their parks:

And now on to the main building on its vineyard.

When I checked out the tombstones, I saw that you can't decypher any of dog names on this kind of November day anymore (whereas you can in August). However, as it wasn't too long after the Day of the Dead, there were new gifts on our antihero's tomb:

However, the Antinous statue, like Wilhelmine's, was behind wood.

Say goodbye to Sorgen, frey, I mean, Sans, Souci.

The giftshop of which also offers this:

Note it comes with a dog.

Near Sanssouci is the Borndstedt estate, so I thought I might as well pay my respects to poor Gundling, who is buried there. Alas, he's buried inside the church, which was closed. (Protestant churches: not always open. I'm spoiled, living in Bavaria, where most of the churches are Catholic and tend to be open all day.) This church:

The cemetery is also the resting place of several other people we know. Can you spot them?

Yes, it's him, most successful RPF writer in the Frederician field:

Also present: Heinrich Ludwig Manger, author of a very interesting building history of Potsdam, master builder for decades for various of the buildings we've seen, and also one of the few memoirists not inclined to go sentimental on Fritz, what with Frederick having locked him up for supposed financial irregularities near the end of the King's life (FW II, nephew and successor, released him at once and cleared his name).

The trip to Potsdam was extra; mainly I was in Berlin on this visit, and between work did check out some Frederician buildings in the city centre when walking past them.

That's the reconstructed town palace (and new Humboldt Forum). If you want to know, I was against them rebuilding it, but then it was done mainly with private sponsors and at least didn't drain public money. However, it does look impressive at night and in the day - from a distance:

The German Historical Museum, nearby, is one one of Grandpa F1's buildings:

Further on at Unter den Linden is the gigantic statue of Frederick. What cracks me up is that it is near both the opera build by Knobelsdorff (check out the inscription) - and Heinrich's town palace that later became the core building of the Humboldt University.