Grand Duke Palace

The utilized property covers an area of approximately four hectares, embedded in a park-like designed outdoor area. The appearance of the garden complex has undergone constant change over the last 140 years and has transformed again with the recent expansion of the Federal Court of Justice.

The essential landscape design features on the north side of the imposing palace, built on an artificial hill, were designed and implemented in 1817 by the then Grand Ducal Baden Chief Building Director Friedrich Weinbrenner in connection with the planning of a garden palace.

The garden on the south side of the palace (the side facing Kriegsstraße) was redesigned at the end of the 19th century in the course of the expansion of the original garden castle by the then head of the Building Directorate, Josef Durm. A central feature was, among other things, a cascade leading down in six steps from a terrace and ending in a round basin with a fountain. With the exception of the terrace, which was completely renovated in 2006, the cascade fell victim in 1970 to the car-friendly development of Kriegsstraße and Karlstor. The existing Galatea Fountain by Karl Friedrich Moest, however, only found its location at the Federal Court of Justice in 1954.

As long as the office of the Federal Prosecutor General at the Federal Court of Justice was also housed on the premises in Herrenstraße, large parts of the garden had to be dismantled and used as parking spaces due to a lack of other alternatives. With the relocation of the Federal Prosecutor's Office to the newly built building in Brauerstraße and the expansion of the Federal Court of Justice in 2003, an originally planned underground car park could not be realized for cost reasons. Nevertheless, the garden regained many elements of its original character. These include in particular the wide lawns and the old tree population.

Despite the relocation of the Federal Prosecutor's Office, the park complex has not yet been made accessible to the public due to the tightened security situation since 2001.