Palais Brühl

The Brühlsche Palais stood at the corner of Augustusstraße and Kleine Fischergasse in Dresden, facing the Brühlsche Terrasse. It was a three-storey building with a mansard roof, designed by Johann Christoph Knöffel between 1737 and 1740. The original façade had nine window bays, centred on a three-bay middle risalto with two sandstone figures by Lorenzo Mattielli, Wisdom and Vigilance, flanking the entrance. The palace’s most striking feature was its Early Rococo façade, praised for its restrained relief and almost flat surface treatment. The middle risalto rose to a triangular pediment with figural relief above the mansard, flanked by two three-window half-storeys. The first-floor windows had wrought-iron balconies, while the upper windows were tall and slender, reflecting light through deep reveals. Inside, a two-storey hall served as the palace’s centrepiece, decorated with allegorical ceiling paintings by Louis de Silvestre and white-and-gold stucco by Matthias Kugler and Joseph Hackl. Visitors entered through a vestibule flanked by Meleager and Flora, leading to a staircase with flat vaults and framed wall panels containing low reliefs of the Morning Wind and Evening Wind. The hall displayed paintings of Saxon electors August the Strong and August III with their wives, alongside mirrors and carved white-and-gold decorations. The palace hosted foreign statesmen including Frederick the Great, Talleyrand, and Tsar Alexander I during their stays in Dresden.