Jetschwil Castle (Düdingen)

The Jetschwil estate is first mentioned in 1243 and was owned by the Velga family in the Middle Ages. Since 1710, when Marie-Rose de Maillard, wife of Pierre-Nicolas de Boccard, acquired the estate from her sister Marie-Marguerite de Pontherose, the de Boccard family has been the owner, a unique case in the canton. The manor house, which included "barns, meadows, enclosures, fields, hemp fields, forests, and other plots of land," was probably rather modest. In 1729, Jean-Hubert de Boccard, who was called to the bishopric, first had a chapel built. After a brilliant military career in the service of France, which ended in 1762, during which he participated at the head of his regiment from 1734 to 1735 in the campaign in the Rhineland and from 1742 to 1748 in Flanders, Alsace, and Brabant, François-Jean-Philippe de Boccard (1696-1782) retired to his estate and, following the example of other Fribourg officers, undertook the renovation of his country seat. Due to a lack of in-depth studies, nothing is known about the exact circumstances of the construction of one of the most beautiful manor houses in the canton. The builder secured the collaboration of the painter Gottfried Locher, based in Mengen (Swabia), "court" painter to their Excellencies, who would entrust him in 1775 with the execution of the ceiling painting in the present Grand Council Chamber in Fribourg.

He had already realized the ceiling paintings in the large salon of Francois-Philippe Reyff de Cugy's house in Fribourg (Herrengasse 14) in 1760 or 61. In 1765, he went to Jetschwil and painted the five large compositions on the ceiling of the large salon there. This work was highly valued, as two years later Tobie de Castella de Delley gave him a similar commission for his urban residence in Fribourg. The reception room at Herrengasse 14 and the large salon in Jetschwil are characterized by the unusual flatness of the windows. In Jetschwil, this light-filled room was conceived in the manner of an enclosed garden pavilion. Behind the two-story and asymmetrical, eight-axis facade and under a Mansard roof, an unusual room distribution is found. This is probably a clever compromise between the type of manor house desired by the builder, the existing building, the slight slope of the plot, and the program imposed on the architect. This room distribution is probably due to the very closed circle of the master who immigrated from Vorarlberg. The L-shaped plan with a distribution emanating from the intersection of the two wings is adapted to the plot. On the ground floor are the chapel and the dining room, while on the first floor a series of rooms precede the gallery-like salon. This arrangement should confirm the intention to add a north-south oriented wing to the old manor house, destined to become the main tract of the new residence.

In addition to its architectural value, the house has preserved its original furnishings from the construction period - furniture from Paris, tiled stoves by André Nuoffer, and wrought-iron works by Josef Soler - as well as its painted decor.