| Near Auerbach in the district of Bergstraße, Fürstenlager has retained its original character |
| until today. Its origins are based upon a mineral healing source discovered in 1739. However, |
| the court’s spa activity which began in 1766 could not be permanently sustained. Starting in |
| 1783, a rural summer residence that was set apart from the strict court etiquette of the |
| residence city of Darmstadt emerged under the future landgraves Ludwig X and Luise of |
| Hesse-Darmstadt. |
| Like a village, the residential and agricultural buildings are grouped around the central |
| Gesundbrunnen (fountain of health). Only the two-storied mansion, which housed the |
| landgravian and grand ducal families, was artistically distinct from the ensemble. Buildings for |
| cavaliers, princes, and women served as living quarters for the court, but also as guest |
| quarters in earlier times. |
| Beginning in 1821, the apartment of Luise’s second-eldest son, Prince Emil, was located in the |
| building known as the outlander’s quarters, or Fremdenbau. |
| Refurnished in 1997, the rooms convey an impression of the Biedermeier lifestyle’s simplicity |
| and intimacy. |
| Using designs by the court gardener, Carl Ludwig Geigner, a large landscape park measuring |
| approximately 42 hectares and modeled after the ornamental farm, was developed in 1790. |
| Geiger took aesthetic as well as economical aspects into account, incorporating already- |
| existing agrarian and grazing fields, vineyards, and fruit meadows into the park’s design. |
| The fascinating topography of the area also contributed to Fürstenburg’s appeal. |
| From the village, a net of sweeping avenues opens out to the narrow, elongated valley, |
leading to decorated spaces, small park buildings, and observation points at the peak of the surrounding hill.
There, the visitor is presented with diverse views towards the village, the park with its decorated buildings and the varied landscape of the
Bergstraße region. In 1865, the court gardener Georg Friedrich Schnittspahn had exotic trees planted at the meadow of the Herrenwiese and
aviary. One of the oldest sequoia trees in Germany has been preserved from this period. Further dendrological treasures include a pyramid oak,
a cucumber magnolia, and a ginkgo.
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