Bad Homburg, Germany, Take Two

The town square

We visited Bad Homburg again with the Faegin family on Halloween night in 2006.  We mostly went to uphold a little tradition we had started (we went the previous year) and go out to eat.  We dressed the kids up, as last year we'd seen plenty of kids out trick-or-treating.  It was funny to see how an American tradition was gradually picking up in some pockets of Germany.

This time we went though, we actually saw one of the more famous sights, the Landgrave castle.  We couldn't believe we missed it last time.

The castle tower

A history of the castle, from http://www.bad-homburg-tourismus.de/en/entdecken/freizeit_schlosspark.htm:

All he left standing was the 14th century keep. The remainder of the medieval Hohenburg was torn down to its foundations to make way for a castle. Landgrave Friedrich II firmly believed in absolutism and was determined to make this very evident to everyone when he became the new ruler of the small Hessen-Homburg Landgraviate in 1677. "Friedrichsburg" – Friedrich's castle – was designed by Paul Andrich, and was the first neo-Baroque residence to be built – from 1680 onwards – after the Thirty Years' War. Its characteristic features, the wings grouped in a regular pattern around two courtyards, exist to this day. The keep was incorporated in the upper castle courtyard, and became the "Weisser Turm" - the white tower that is the landmark of Bad Homburg. The foyer displays a contemporary bronze bust by Andreas Schlüter of the builder of the castle, to whom Heinrich von Kleist gave literary immortality in his work "Prince of Homburg".

Caedmon all dressed up

The Landgraves resided at the castle until 1866, when the dynasty died out and the castle passed to Prussia – at which point the German Emperors "discovered" Homburg. They set up summer residence at the castle. Wilhelm II and his family were particularly frequent visitors to the spa town. The museum rooms at the castle house numerous treasures of art from the 17th through the 19th centuries, and bear witness to how "Emperors" lived. The Royal Wing with the Imperial chambers is, however, closed for refurbishment.

Holly & December near an old tower

The rooms on show in the English Wing are where Elizabeth lived after her husband, Landgrave Friedrich VI Joseph died in 1829. They reflect the personality, artistic talent and untiring habit of collecting things of this daughter of an English king who married into the Hessen-Homburg dynasty in 1818.

Her brother gifted two Lebanese cedars as a wedding present. These have meanwhile grown into majestic trees and can be found next to the portal leading to the Royal Wing. This part of the Castle Park is a formal Baroque garden, as indeed it was when Friedrich II was alive, and is bordered by the Orangerie. At the foot of the castle hill, an English landscaped park with romantic corners and a small lake invites visitors to stroll and relax a while.