Lustheim Palace
A "pleasure buildng" that set an example in architectural history with a type of ceiling fresco that was new at that time. An exquisite collection of Meissen porcelain.
The hunting lodge and garden palace, Lustheim Palace, which the Elector Max Emanuel of Bavaria had built in 1684 to 1689, on the occasion of his marraige to the Austrian Emperor's daughter, Maria Antonia, is in the park of Schleissheim Palace. Surrounded by a ring-shaped canal, it is on an artificial island which symbolises the island of love, Kythera. Together with the Old Schleissheim Palace and the New Schleissheim Palace, which lie at the other end of the park, Lustheim Palace forms one of the most significant baroque estates in Germany.
Max Emanuel commissioned the Bavarian court architect, Enrico Zucalli from Graubrünen with building the palace, which reflects Italian influences. Both the castle consisting of three structural cubes, and the garden pavillions on either side of the canal whose facades are copies of the Villa Madama in Rome, display elements of Italian architecture. The taller main building is set back between flanking projections. Its front is decorated by twin colossal pilasters. There are two-storey wings on the sides.
It is possible to see the division of the interior rooms in the layout. In the main building, a banquet hall extends over two storeys, from which the appartments of the Elector and the Electress on each side can be accessed. The plain living quarters of their entourage used to be on top floor, and the kitchen and lounges for the servants were in the basement.
The banquet hall and the electoral appartments are decorated with ceiling frescos which glorify Diana, the goddess of hunting. This first cycle of secular ceiling frescoes in Bavaria - which arose in 1686/87 - featured the work of the masters Francesco Rosa, Giovanni Trubillio and Johann Anton Gumpp.
Today, the treasure of Lustheim is the Meissen porcelain collection, donated to the Bavarian National Museum by Mr Ernst Schneider in 1968. The extraordnary collection includes 1800 pieces from the heyday of Meissen manufactory in the 18th century, with early tableware by Böttger, chinoiseries by Höroldt and the famous animal figures by Kändler, up to porcelain from the time of the Seven Years War.