New castle (Gießen)

The Neues Schloss stands at the heart of Gießen, a university town in central Hesse. Built between 1533 and 1539 for Landgraf Philipp the Magnanimous, it marks the shift from medieval hall-castle to Renaissance palace. Its walls rise in mixed stone-and-timber style, measuring about thirty-five metres long and twelve wide. The building survived the Second World War almost unharmed while the adjacent Zeughaus and the Alte Schloss were destroyed. From 1946 the rooms housed the polytechnic school before becoming home to the Institute of Geography at Justus-Liebig University.

The structure is one of Hesse’s most important half-timbered buildings of its period. After 1650 it served as the university chancellery and a court of law. A major restoration between 1899 and 1907 returned its Renaissance features. The same restoration revealed earlier Gothic elements still embedded in the walls. Herbert Krüger later published a detailed study of the building in the Gießener Hochschulgesellschaft journal.

Inside, visitors find a sequence of vaulted chambers and wide staircases that echo its dual architectural heritage. The ground floor rooms now hold seminar spaces and a small teaching collection of geological specimens. Tall windows look onto the Brandplatz and the surviving Zeughaus wall to the east. Beyond the forecourt lie the Botanical Garden and the ruins of the Alte Schloss, framing the site with layers of history.