COLLOREDO-MANSFELD PALACE

The Baroque building, located at one of the most frequented sites of old Prague − next to Charles Bridge – grew on the foundations of a Romanesque and Gothic built-up area and a Renaissance house. Its owners included an array of interesting personalities, from Count Joachim Andreas von Schlick, who was executed for his participation in the Prague Estatesʼ rebellion, the Jesuit Order and the Elector of Saxony, the cruel Count de Breda, to Prince Heinrich Paul von Mansfeld-Fondi.

Between 1736 and 1737, the Prince invited Franz Ignatius Pree to rebuild the original palace, probably designed by Giovanni Battista Alliprandi, along the lines of High Baroque. The palace interiors then received their final Neo-Rococo look during the 1860s thanks to the Auersperg family who, around 1900, also transformed an extensive part of the palace into a luxurious rental house. The most beautiful and perhaps the best preserved space in the palace is its dance hall whose decoration was probably completed between 1736 and 1737. The ceiling fresco with the assembled Olympian gods was created by Pietro Scotti and Giovanni Battista Zeist.

The palace is not only linked with distinguished noble families but also many with many cultural and historical events, among them the last session of the royal council of the “Winter King” Frederick V., Elector Palatine, after the 1620 Battle of White Mountain.

During the period after the Second World War, the palace was used by the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences, and it is today managed by the Prague City Gallery which is preparing its dignified reconstruction and will incorporate it into its activities.