In 2005, the renovations of the Palace of Oscarshall started. In autumn 2006 it was closed for the public. The palace will be reopened for visitors on august 26th. The King and Queen of Norway already attended the official opening of the castle on August 20th.
Click at the image to see it at kongehuset.no
The Palace of Oscarshall is situated on the peninsula of Bygdø, in Oslo. The palace is built on a rise, with a garden sloping down to the Oslo Fjord.
A picture gallery can be found at Side2
The palace was built from 1847 to 1852 by King Oscar I. In 1863 the castle was sold to the state and became the disposal of the reigning monarch ever since. In 1881 the palace was opened to the public by King Oscar II.
The palace consists of a three-story main building, a park running down to the sea, with fountains, an open, six-sided pavilion, a caretaker’s lodge, a separate building for the kitchens and a service lodge down by the water.
You can find out more about Oscarshall here. A thread at TRF can be found here. You can find many pictures of the interiors of the castle on this site.
Her_Majesty Norwegian Royals Harald V, Palace of Oscarshall, Palaces, Queen Sonja, Renovations
From the TRF Avatar gallery
King Albert II of Belgium has offered the Belgian government to help them to pay for the renovation costs necessary to freshen up the Royal Palace in Brussels. The Palace will be used for the European-Asian Summit (ASEM) during the Belgian presidency of the European Union. The Belgian government will pay for the refurbishment of the Palace. Most of the works will be painting and brushing up other details.
King Albert offered to take responsibility for part of the bill, to an amount of 600,000 EUR maximum. The money will come from the Civil List, the “dotation” of the King. The King wants to help the Belgian government, which is currently heading for an immense deficit in the budget, by taking on about a third of the projected costs. He suggested this during an audience with Prime Minister Van Rompuy.
For an article on the subject, see here.
LadyLeana Belgian Royals European Union, Finances, King Albert II, Renovations, Royal Palace (Brussels)
The future home of Crown Prince Frederik, Crown Princess Mary and their two children will be open to the public next year, so the public can view the recent renovations which have been taking place since 2004.
Click to see the image at ses.dk
Frederik VIII’s Palace, formerly Brockdorf’s Manor, in Amalienborg will be open to the public from February 28 to May 30. The Palaces and Properties Agency announced the news earlier this week, with BT reporting that not all the rooms will be open. The private rooms of the family will not be available for viewing, only the areas which will be used in the future for public engagements.
Various exterior and interior renovations have had to be undertaken before the family could move in, as the Palace was in serious disrepair at the turn of the new millenium. The last occupant of the Palace was the late Queen Ingrid, who lived in the Palace until her November 2000 death. She and her husband, the late King Frederik IX, moved into the Palace in 1935-36, which was when the last renovations took place. Read more…
JessRulz Danish Royals Frederik VIII's Palace (Amalienborg), Palaces, Prince Frederik, Princess Mary, Renovations, Residences
Click on image to see picture at wikipedia
As mayor Job Cohen announced last weekend, when the royal palace on Dam square in Amsterdam was reopened, the exterior of the palace will be cleaned extensively. Newspaper NRC Handelsblad reports that this morning the city showed a concept decision, in which they approve of the cleaning. Only three years ago they were against it as they were afraid that the stones would be damaged during the cleaning.
The Service for national buildings (Rijksgebouwendienst) estimates that the cleaning will cost 40 million Euros. The cleaning will start with steam, after that they will laser it and when needed they will retouch them. It is still unclear how they will retouch the stones, one option is by spraying it with mineral paint. Some stones will even be replaced.
The result will be that the palace will have a lighter color, more closely resembling how it looked before 400 years of polution damaged the stones. Critics however say that the cleaning is useless, agressive, damaging and historically incorrect. People can still object against the plans by filing a complaint, which is possible for six weeks.
Marengo Dutch Royals Palaces, Renovations, Royal Palace (Amsterdam)
Click on image to see photo at telegraaf.nl
- Click on image to see photo at telegraaf.nl
Yesterday queen Beatrix reopened the royal palace on Dam square in Amsterdam. The palace was closed for 3,5 years as the interior was adapted. The palace, that was originally built as a city hall in 1648, got new kitchens and bathrooms, furniture was restaured, 45.000 kilo of asbestos was removed and the chandeliers that were found on the attic were restaured and used in several rooms of the palace. The leader of the project was happy to announce that he stayed within the budget of 81 million euros. However, the main hall of the palace, the impressive Citizen’s Hall, was not restaured due to lack of money. ‘It is like restauring Versailles and leaving out the Hall of Mirrors’, commented renovation architect Krijn van den Ende in newspaper ‘De Telegraaf’. Still, the result of the restauration is impressive, the use of old chandeliers, new curtains, carpets and furniture makes the palace actually looking like a palace. During the last renovation in the 60-ties many of these things were removed as they wanted the palace to resemble the original 17th century style as much as possible. As a result the palace looked like a cold and empty city hall instead of a palace, as which it is functioning since 1808.
Click on image to see photo at telegraaf.nl
Click on image to see photo at nrc.nl
Mayor Job Cohen of Amsterdam held a speech during the opening, for an audience of 400 guests, mostly people involved with the project but also to queen Beatrix and her sister princess Margriet. ‘Welcome home, your majesty’, the mayor started his speech. He also told the audience that ‘there will always be critics who think that things should have been done differently. The media quickly calls critics ‘experts’, but they are selling a lot of nonsense’. The mayor also said that more information about the exterior of the palace will be announced soon. It is hoped that the exterior will be cleaned, as the sand coloured stones turned black and grey over the years. The royal palace in Amsterdam is opened to the public for six months a year. The opening hours can be found on their official website, click here.
Marengo Dutch Royals Palaces, Princess Margriet, Queen Beatrix, Renovations, Royal Palace (Amsterdam)
- Click on image to see picture at wikipedia
Click on image to see picture at wikipedia
On June 13th, queen Beatrix will officially open the renovated royal palace on Dam square, in Amsterdam. A day later the public is already allowed to take a look. That was announced by the ministairy of general affairs today.
The palace underwent an extensive renovation that lasted for 3,5 years. The interior has been modernized where needed (in the kitchen for example), while other parts have been carefully restaured to old splendor.
The palace has been built in the 17th century and originally was used as a city hall. King Louis Napoleon however changed the function of the city hall and turned it into a palace. He was the only king who ever lived in the palace. The kings from the house of Orange-Nassau mainly used it for representational purposes.
The palace will display a presention of the restauration, so visitors can see for themselves what happened the last 3,5 years. The palace also has the largest collection of empire furniture that can be found outside France, but newer pieces of furniture, from the reigns of king Willem I and king Willem II are used now too.
Marengo Dutch Royals Palaces, Queen Beatrix, Renovations, Royal Palace (Amsterdam)
Click on image to see photo at www.sudkurier.de
Tuesday it was announced that the renovation of Schloss Salem will cost 47 million euros. The costs will however be spread over a period of 25 years. In the upcoming 10 years the costs will be 20 million euros.
Last year the former Grand Ducal family of Baden announced their intention to sell the castle, that is located near the Bodensee in Southern Germany. After a few unsuitable potential buyers finally the state of Baden-Württemberg decided to buy the castle and the art collection of the family for the amount of nearly 60 million euros. To be more precise, the payment for the castle was 25,8 million euros, for Salem’s art collection 17,0 million euros and for art with undecided ownership 15 million euros.
According to the newspaper ‘Südkurier’ the agreement between the state of Baden-Württemberg and the former Grand Ducal family is expected to be signed March 19, 2009.
Click here to visit the official website of Salem Castle and click here, here and here to read the original articles of the Südkurier in German. Courtesy: TRF member Avicenna.
Marengo German Royals Baden, Palaces, Renovations
