Hütscheroda Manor

Around 1527, the Lords of Wangenheim became owners of the Hütscheroda estate. They were the most significant landowners in this part of the Duchy. In 1680, a manor house, which gives the village its character, was built on the vaults of a 13th-century sheep farm. The estate included 2200 acres of meadows and lands.

Military Training Area

Even before the start of the Second World War, the manor owner and Eisenach patron Eichel-Streiber, based in Eisenach and the neighboring village of Berka vor dem Hainich, sold an approximately 300-hectare plot of land on the border with Hütscheroda for the establishment of a military training area at Künkel. The military area initially served as a testing and firing range for artillery pieces manufactured in Eisenach. After the war, the Kindel firing range was further expanded and handed over to the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany as a tank firing range. Already in 1946, the last lord of the manor, Baron Werner von Wangenheim, was expelled from his property; he later died in Gotha.

New Farmer Settlement Hütscheroda

During the socialist era, the estate building was used by the then LPG (Agricultural Production Cooperative) and housed a post office, a consumer sales outlet, and at times a restaurant. On the southern edge of the estate, further settlement houses were built for the families of the new farmers who settled here after the land reform. Due to the proximity to the Kindel firing range, living conditions were harsh, with the military restricted area reaching right up to the residential houses.

After Reunification

In 1991, the main building of the former manor and the LPG was taken over by a company and converted into a hotel and conference venue. The new owner was a co-initiator of the Hütscheroda art project; since 1997, the sculpture trail from Hütscheroda to Behringen has been expanded with newly created objects.