Belvedere on Pfingstberg Hill

Pfingstberg Hill provides a wonderful view over the city of Potsdam and its picturesque landscape of rivers and lakes. Indeed it was this view that inspired Frederick William IV to have a belvedere constructed on it. The design for this impressive building with its two towers was provided by the artistically minded King himself, who modelled it on Renaissance villas he had come across in Italy. Starting in 1847, these plans were put into effect by the architects Ludwig Persius, Friedrich August Stüler and Ludwig Ferdinand Hesse. Five years later, construction was interrupted in favour of the newly begun work on the Orangery Palace in Sanssouci Park, and the King did not himself live to see the completion of the Belvedere in 1863, having died two years earlier. His brother William I saw the project on Pfingstberg Hill through to its conclusion, albeit on a smaller scale. Yet this does nothing to diminish the beauty and harmony of the Belvedere and its grounds, thanks in no small measure to the design of the park by Peter Joseph Lenné...