Potsdam

For a break from Berlin’s assault on the senses, we took a local train to Potsdam and visited the Sansouci Palace and Park, constructed in the 1700’s by King Frederick the Great.

In the peaceful, cool early morning, we came first to the New Palace and took some pictures of the outside. Then we realised that the building we were looking at wasn’t the New Palace at all - the New Palace was opposite and covered in scaffolding from head to toe.

Inside was a celebration of rococo swirls, in the form of all sorts of plants and animals, with gilt paint everywhere you couldn’t fit a painting or beautiful piece of furniture.

Any palace worth its salt, it seems, must have a grotto, and the New Palace’s one reached new heights of artistry, with shells designed into every conceivable pattern. Unfortunately, though, Frederick insisted the ceiling be unsupported, a fine idea until you install a 90-ton marble floor in the room upstairs - it took three attempts over the years to stabilise the floor.

There are a number of other palaces and pavilions in the park. We looked in at the Chinese House, following the European fad for all things oriental, although since the figures outside were sculpted using local models, they all looked strangely European, and then the Orangery Palace. At the end of the war, a Russian soldier scratched some words and the year “1945” into one of the wall paintings; it is here to this day.

Sansouci Palace itself, built in 1847 as a getaway for the king, is much smaller than the new palace, and is positioned at the top of a hill of vines, making it a photogenic location, except that the rise of the hill obscures the bottom half of the building. It does, however, look down on beautifully laid out gardens.

Frederick’s rococo predilections really show here, too, with ornate embellishments everywhere. In a different vein, especially, was the Yellow Room, floor to ceiling with all sorts of painted animal and plant embellishments.

There was a whole lot more to see, but we ran out of time; the rest will have to wait for another time.Read more