The Palais du Rhin, the former Kaiserpalast (Imperial palace), is a building situated in the German (north-east) quarter of Strasbourg (Neustadt) dominating the Place de la République (the former Kaiserplatz) with its massive dome. A huge building, it and the surrounding gardens, as well as the neighbouring stables, are an outstanding landmark of 19th-century Prussian architecture.
History
After the Franco-Prussian War, Strasbourg, then German, was faced with the question of an official residence for the Kaiser. The decision was made to create a building symbolic of imperial power, and after much debate, a square Neo-Renaissance design was chosen, remotely inspired by the Palazzo Pitti in Florence. The architect was Hermann Eggert (1844–1920), who had already built, among other things, the Observatory of Strasbourg.
Work began on March 22, 1884 in honour of William I's 87th birthday, and construction took five years. The project received a good deal of criticism, with many questioning the need and use of the building, its appearance, and its price of three million marks.
Inaugurated by William II in August 1889, the palace housed the emperor for twelve visits down to 1914.
During the First World War, the building was converted into a military hospital and in 1920 it adopted its current name when the oldest of the European institutions, the Central Commission for Navigation on the Rhine, moved in.
In 1923, the palace passed hands to the French state and today houses the Direction régionale des affaires culturelles (DRAC) of Grand Est.
Transformed into the 'Kommandantur' by the Nazis between 1940 and 1945, the building was recaptured by the troops of General Leclerc, who transformed it into their general headquarters. It was there that he wrote his proclamation announcing the realization of his oath at Kufra, proclaiming that he would fight until the French flag flew again over the cathedrals of Strasbourg and Metz.
Threatened with destruction in the 1970s, the palace, classified as monument historique since 1993, also houses the Direction régionale des Affaires culturelles of Alsace (DRAC Alsace).
In 2008, the Palais was used as the setting of the Paris Gestapo headquarters (in fact situated in the Hôtel Lutetia) for the shooting of the French TV mini-series "La Résistance".

Palais du Rhin

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The Palais Rohan (Rohan Palace) in Strasbourg is the former residence of the prince-bishops and cardinals of the House of Rohan, an ancient French noble family originally from Brittany. It is a major architectural, historical, and cultural landmark in the city. It was built next to Strasbourg Cathedral in the 1730s, from designs by Robert de Cotte, and is considered a masterpiece of French Baroque architecture. Since its completion in 1742, the palace has hosted a number of French monarchs such as Louis XV, Marie Antoinette, Napoleon and Joséphine, and Charles X.
Reflecting the history of Strasbourg and of France, the palace has been owned successively by the nobility, the municipality, the monarchy, the state, the university, and the municipality again. Its architectural conception and its iconography were intended to indicate the return of Roman Catholicism to the city, which had been dominated by Protestantism for the previous two centuries. Thus the prelate's apartments face the cathedral, to the north, and many of the statues, reliefs and paintings reflect the Catholic dogma.
Since the end of the 19th century the palace has been home to three of Strasbourg's most important museums: the Archaeological Museum (Musée archéologique, basement), the Museum of Decorative Arts (Musée des arts décoratifs, ground floor) and the Museum of Fine Arts (Musée des beaux-arts, first and second floor). The municipal art gallery, Galerie Robert Heitz, in a lateral wing of the palace, is used for temporary exhibitions. The Palais Rohan has been listed since 1920 as a Monument historique by the French Ministry of Culture.
History
Up to 1871
In 1727 Armand Gaston Maximilien de Rohan, bishop of Strasbourg since 1704 and cardinal since 1712, commissioned the architect Robert de Cotte to design the palace; de Cotte provided initial plans the same year. Seven years prior, in 1720, Cardinal de Rohan had already charged de Cotte with renovation and embellishment works on his castle in Saverne, the predecessor of the current Rohan Castle. De Cotte had also previously designed the Hôtel du grand Doyenné, the first hôtel particulier in Louis Quinze style built in Strasbourg. The Palais Rohan was built on the site of the former residence of the bishop, the "bishop's demesne", which is recorded since at least 1262. The area itself is near the heart of the ancient Argentoratum, first mentioned in 12 BC. Diverse archaeological excavations on Place du Château, the square facing the palace, have unearthed many remains of the Roman camp.
Building work on the Palais Rohan took place from 1732 until 1742 under the supervision of the municipal architect Joseph Massol, who also worked on the Hôtel de Hanau and the Hôtel de Klinglin during the early years of the project. Massol was assisted by the architects Laurent Gourlade and Étienne Le Chevalier. The sculptures, including statues as well as reliefs, were provided by Robert Le Lorrain, assisted by Johann August Nahl, Gaspard Pollet, and Laurent Leprince, and the paintings by Pierre Ignace Parrocel (it) and Robert de Séry (fr). The ébéniste Bernard Kocke and the ironworkers and locksmiths Jean-François Agon and his son Antoine Agon worked on the furnishings of the apartments, while the stucco was the work of the Italians Castelli and Morsegno. A budget of 344,000 French livres had been established for the construction – 200,000 livres lent from the Cathedral chapter (Grand Chapitre) and 144,000 raised as local taxes over a period of twelve years – but the final cost is estimated at one million French livres. The palace is mostly built in yellow sandstone from Wasselonne, with pink sandstone for the less visible parts.
The House of Rohan owned the palace until the French Revolution, when it was confiscated, declared bien national ("state owned"), and finally auctioned off on 8 August 1791. Bought by the municipality, it became the new town hall (hôtel de ville) the same year, succeeding the Neubau. Much of the furniture and many of the works of art in the Palais were sold, and in 1793 the eight life-sized mural portraits of prince-bishops decorating the Salle des évêques (Bishops' Hall) were destroyed. They were replaced in 1796 by allegories of civic virtues painted by Joseph Melling. Only the portrait of Armand Gaston, the builder of the palace, was later restored to its original place with a 1982 replica of Hyacinthe Rigaud's lost painting. Melling also replaced the overdoor portraits of kings of France, decorating the same room with paintings of vases.
The Palais Rohan remained the hôtel de ville until 1805. That year, the municipality presented it to Napoleon, who returned the Hôtel de Hanau in exchange. Like the palace, the hôtel had been state-owned since the Revolution. The 1805 arrangement proved favourable for the municipality: the maintenance of the Hôtel de Hanau was less costly than that of the larger Palais Rohan. It pleased Napoleon, for whom the palace was the more conspicuous display of grandeur. As for the palace, imperial ownership meant renewed splendour. The present to Napoleon was officially accepted by decree on 21 January 1806; the interiors were then refurbished by the architect Pierre-François-Léonard Fontaine. In the years before the Franco-Prussian War and the return of Alsace to Germany, the Palais Rohan was the property of the French state, which was in turn an empire, a kingdom, a monarchy, a republic, and again an empire.
Since 1871
The year 1871 signified the end of French rule and the beginning of German rule over Alsace, which had until 1681 been linked to Germany through the Holy Roman Empire. Having lost the Franco-Prussian War, France had to cede the departments of Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin, and Moselle (the territory also known as Alsace-Lorraine, or Elsass-Lothringen in German) to the newly created German Empire. Now under new administration and having lost its residential purpose, the Palais Rohan had to be assigned a new role. Between 1872 and 1884, until the opening of the Palais universitaire, it was used by the newly established Kaiser-Wilhelms-Universität, the Imperial German version of the University of Strasbourg, as the seat of the faculties of law, philosophy, and sciences. The palace then served as the university's library until the opening of the National and University Library in 1895. After this, the palace again became the property of the city and was adapted to receive the municipal art collections that were being built up again by director Wilhelm von Bode after their total destruction during the Siege of Strasbourg (see below, Musée des beaux-arts). The first section of the new Kunstmuseum der Stadt Strassburg, established in 1898, was inaugurated in 1899.
After the return of Alsace to French rule in 1918, the new director of the Musée des beaux-arts and the Musée des arts décoratifs, Hans Haug (1890–1965), put major efforts into presenting the Palais Rohan as a coherent whole again. Strasbourg suffered during World War II, and on 11 August 1944 the palace was damaged by British and American bombs. After the war, restoration measures were soon undertaken under the supervision of the architects Robert Danis (1879–1949) and Bertrand Monnet (1910–1989), but in 1947 a fire broke out and devastated a significant part of the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts. This fire was an indirect consequence of the bombing raids: because of the destruction inflicted on the palace, the building had suffered from damp, which was treated with welding torches, and poor handling of these caused the fire.
Rebuilding and refurbishing the palace took until well into the 1950s, with full restoration not completed until the 1990s. In 1989 a large trompe-l'œil fresco depicting the Roman goddess Ceres was rediscovered behind layers of plaster and white paint in the former dining hall, the eastern wing of the Synod Hall (see below, Apartments). It is thought to have been concealed under Napoleonic ownership, and had been forgotten since.

Palais des Rohan

The Château de Pourtalès was built around 1750 by the Bussière family, a wealthy Strasbourg industrial family, on the site of a country house. Especially in the years 1870 to 1914, at the invitation of the Comtesse Mélanie and Count Pourtalès, the European aristocracy and all kinds of celebrities met here at the Château.
Albert Schweitzer, Franz Liszt, Napoléon III, Empress Eugénie, the Princes of Belgium and Russia, Ludwig I of Bavaria, the Grand Duke of Baden or the Princes Metternich, to name but a few, came and went here.
With the two world wars it went steadily downhill. At first the castle was occupied by the Germans, later liberated by the Americans. After the Second World War, an Eastern European university was accommodated here for a short time, which, however, had to be closed again with the construction of the Berlin Wall.
The castle was almost demolished when Dr. Walter Leibrecht, the founder of Schiller International University, bought the building in 1972 and began reconstruction. For more than 25 years, students of Schiller International University were accommodated here. Since the transfer of the hotel management studies to Switzerland, the rooms are mainly available for guests. The Château de Pourtalès still welcomes guests from all over the world. It is available as a campus for students from international universities and has become a second home for many Members of the European Parliament during the session weeks.
https://www.chateau-pourtales.eu

Château de Pourtalès

The Château de Kolbsheim is located near the town of Kolbsheim, in the French Department of Bas-Rhin, in Alsace. It is 15 kilometers southwest of Strasbourg, overlooking the plain of Alsace.
The chateau has two wings, the oldest built in 1703. The upper part of the garden is geometric French garden, decorated with ponds, fountains, hedges and sculpted trees. The lower part is an English park, with many hundred-year old trees. Much of the garden was destroyed in the First World War, but was restored by the Grunelius family, the present owners.
The Garden is classified by the French Ministry of Culture as among The Notable Gardens of France.

Château de Kolbsheim

Dating back to the Roman Empire after the conquest of Alsace by Caesar, the castle was part of intelligence measures to ward off Germanic incursions.
During the 12th century and onwards, Osthoffen became a fortified castle. Due to a siege lead by the Bishop of Strasbourg in 1410, fire raged through the building, depriving it of its 3rd floor.
An ancestor, the architect von Seebach, rebuilt the castle as a Rennaissance estate and a private dwelling, its military mission finally coming to a close after the Thirty Years War (1648).
 More changes came about with the 18th century  courtyard walls were removed and new wide windows enlightened both the façade and the interior. The castle lost its towers during the French Revolution by order of the new authorities, one of the first works undertaken by the new owner was to rebuilt them.
https://www.chateau-dosthoffen.com

Château d'Osthoffen

The Château des Rohan ("Castle of the Rohan") is a former castle and weapons factory now serving as a museum and cultural centre in the French town of Mutzig, Bas-Rhin, Alsace. The castle, whose structure goes back to the 13th century, belonged to several families of noblemen and bishops of Strasbourg before being turned into a rifle factory after the French Revolution. The castle is most famously associated with the House of Rohan and the Chassepot rifle.
History
Mutzig's castle's history goes back to the fortification of the town in 1274 by Rudolph of Habsburg. The medieval castle, a Wasserburg (i.e. surrounded by a moat derived from a canal) was heavily destroyed by the Swedes in 1632, during the Thirty Years' War, after having already been assaulted by Ernst von Mansfeld's troops in 1622. The city's and castle's masters, during these times marked by frequent battles and rivalries between feudal families, were alternatively and sometimes simultaneously the bishops of Strasbourg and the House of Zweibrücken.
The castle as it now appears is a Baroque structure. It was inaugurated in its present shape in 1673 to serve as the residence of the bishop of Strasbourg, Franz Egon of Fürstenberg. Fürstenberg was succeeded by his brother Wilhelm Egon. After the family of Rohan took over the bishopric of Strasbourg, the castle served as a residence to the dukes Armand Gaston, François-Armand, Louis Constantin and Louis René Édouard de Rohan, between 1704 and 1790. However, after the completion of the Palais Rohan of Strasbourg in 1742, the château, which had already been rivalled by the residences in Saverne, became only of secondary importance to the family. Mutzig's castle was disowned and pillaged during the French Revolution. In 1799, it was bought by the arms manufacturers, brothers Coulaux of Klingenthal, Bas-Rhin, who, on 20. April 1801, opened their weapons factory in its walls. The factory ran until the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870. It is there, in the Manufacture d'Armes de Mutzig (also known as Manufacture impériale de Mutzig) that the native of Mutzig, Antoine Alphonse Chassepot fabricated some of his famous rifles, one of the most advanced firearms of its time. The castle was fortified again by the Germans in 1893. Today, the castle houses a cinema and a library as well as, since 1996, the municipal museum Musée régional d'armes (previously, since 1977, the Musée des Rohan) displaying a vast collection of historic rifles.
The castle is listed as a Monument historique since 1976 by the French Ministry of Culture.

Château des Rohan (Mutzig)

La première mention historique du lieu se situe en 1185, lorsque Sigebert III prend le titre de comte de Werde. On ignore si le château remonte à cette date ou si un château primitif est alors restauré comme l’avance le frère Sitzmann.
Le château de Werde était un des plus importants de la contrée. Les vestiges et les fondations que l’on trouve encore çà et là, permettent d’établir qu’il était semblable aux châteaux de ce temps. Un pont-levis, des doubles fossés larges de 20 mètres, encaissés entre deux remparts séparait l’enceinte dans laquelle se trouvait la forteresse. Au lieu de se trouver au centre, comme habituellement, le donjon de Werde s’élançait à l’extrémité Sud-Est de la cour seigneuriale, pour lui permettre de dominer le pays et la rivière.
Les descendants de Sigebert ont obtenu en 1192 le titre de Landgrave de la basse Alsace et ont pris le nom de comte de Werde. Les Landgraves de Werde se succédèrent paisiblement pendant deux siècles où un seul évènement est à signaler : à la mort de Rodolphe de Habsbourg, Jean de Werde avait pris parti pour la succession de son fils mais Adolphe de Nassau ayant été élu empereur à la suite de Rodolphe vint assiéger Werde et pris d’assaut le Château le 27 octobre 1293.
Le comte Ulric de Werde succéda à son frère mais se ruinera au service de Louis de Bavière. Ulric fut amené à vendre une partie de ces biens et à céder l’autre partie à son gendre Frédéric d’Oettingen, mari de sa fille Adélaïde ; il lui céda également la dignité de Landvogt.
Frédéric mourut en 1357, son fils Louis-le-jeune lui succéda, mais ne se plaisant pas en Alsace, il vendit le 25 janvier 1359, le titre de Landgrave, le château de Werde, les domaines, les alleux, les fiefs, droits et privilèges, tous ses biens et titres à Jean de Lichtenberg, évèque de Strasbourg, qui les transmit à ses successeurs à l’évèché.
Ainsi s’éteint la branche des Landgraves de Werde dont les armoiries ornent encore la moitié du drapeau alsacien et dont les gisants de deux d’entre eux reposent encore à Saint Guillaume à Strasbourg. Aucun des évèques de Strasbourg ne prit jamais le titre de Landgraves peu soucieux, sans doute, d’en assumer les lourdes charges.
Les évèques de Strasbourg vont donner en fiefs le château à différentes et illustres familles alsaciennes, successivenment : Jean d’Ochsenstein, Hugues de Géroldseck-des-vosges, aux D’Andlau et aux Zorn de Bulach. Ceux-ci, ayant passé au protestantisme, furent évincés par l’évèque Erasme de Limbourg moyennant une indemnité consécutive aux importants travaux que les Zorn avaient menés à Werde. Georges Zorn se retira alors à Osthausen et construisit le château actuel. A sa mort en 1567, ce fut la branche aînée, dite de Dorlisheim, restée catholique qui prit possession du château, qu’elle occupe encore.
Après les Zorn de Bulach, l’évèque investit les barons de Seebach qui transformèrent alors le château fort en château d’habitation et rénovèrent le moulin. En se basant sur des considérations archéologiques, on peut admettre que la petite aile du château (aile nord) date de cette époque.
A  la mort du dernier descendant de la famille des barons de Seebach, l’évèque investit du titre de comte de Werde et d’Uttenheim les nobles de Reinach-Foussemagne en 1656. Une des branches de cette famille prend le nom de Reinach-Werde. Le dernier propriétaire noble de Werde était Guillaume-Jacques-Maximilien-Antoine Reinach Werde.
A  l’approche de la tempête révolutionnaire, celui-ci était en conflit avec la communauté d’Uttenheim pour des futilités. Après la prise de la bastille, les paysans d’Uttenheim allèrent en armes au château de Werde. Guillaume de Reinach s’y trouvait pour une partie de chasse, on était au dîner lorsque cette foule exaltée, criant et vociférant, conduite par le forgeron muni de son lourd marteau, vint sommer le seigneur de lui livrer immédiatement ses titres de propriétés. Celui-ci leur déclara simplement qu’ils se trouvaient à Benfeld, chez son homme d’affaire. Les forcenés s’y rendirent , tandis que le baron passait le Rhin et emigra à Rastatt ou il mourut en janvier 1792. Furieux, les gens d’Uttenheim saccagèrent et brûlèrent le second château de Guillaume qu’il possédait dans leur localité.
Après la révolution le château de Werde fut décrété comme bien national et vendu. Les autres dépendances et le moulin furent vendu en 1804 par la veuve et les descendants de Guillaume revenus habiter à Niedernai. Différents propriétaires se sont succédés au cours du XIX siècle jusqu’à l’abbé Mertian supérieur des frères de la doctrine Chrétienne qui rachète le château le 1er septembre 1865 et y entreprend d’importants travaux.
L’aspect actuel du château, uniformisé et bien plus modeste qu’à ces origines remonte partiellement à cette époque avec des éléments renaissance dans le corps de logis nord et une structure 18e dans celui du Sud.
Illustration : Le château de Werde primitif imaginé par le frère Sitzmann
http://www.chateaudewerde.com