Pszczyna Castle

The castle sits on a medieval defensive plan that began as a compact quadrangle. The original arrangement consisted of two nearly parallel residential ranges joined by linking walls and protected to the south by a pair of towers, surrounded by earth ramparts, a moat and a drawbridge. Over time that fortified rectangle was altered, enlarged and finally opened toward the market when mid‑18th-century rebuilding produced a three‑wing palace with its open side facing the town square.

Beneath the upper floors, Gothic stone cellars survive and remain accessible today. These vaulted underground chambers are constructed of masonry typical of medieval work and now accommodate the armory display on level space opened to visitors in 2006. A medieval tower survives within later building work and was adapted for internal circulation; it contains a concealed stair that was later enclosed within the evolved palace fabric.

The post-1680 layout centred on an arcaded courtyard. After the late‑seventeenth-century restoration the building presented as a two‑storey block surrounding a rectangular inner court about 38 by 22 metres. The inner façades retain evidence of arcade galleries and three-storey cloisters lining the courtyard. Measured external lengths vary between roughly 47 and 57 metres. The masonry shows progressive reduction in wall thickness with height, from over two metres at the lowest courses, to about 1.8 metres at the first floor, and under one metre on the upper level.

A principal entrance built in 1687 marks the approach to the inner court. This guard building, known locally as the Gate of the Chosen, is constructed in stone and brick, bears the owners’ coats of arms and carries a Latin dedicatory inscription recording its date. The gateway framed the route from the outer enclosure into the arcaded court and functioned as both defensive and ceremonial threshold.

Eighteenth-century rebuildings gave the palace its horseshoe plan and a new street-facing aspect. Ground-floor masonry was worked to present a rusticated base and the upper storeys were articulated with projecting window surrounds and pilasters in a classical order. A mansard roof with dormer windows tops the composition. In 1768 the level of the inner court was raised, and what had been the ground floor became cellars while the former first floor became the new ground floor, altering access and internal circulation.

Nineteenth-century remodelling reworked both silhouette and principal reception rooms. The external elevations were dressed in a French seventeenth-century manner and roof volumes were enlarged to create a heavier profile, topped by a prominent mast bearing a heraldic flag. Inside, an ornate vestibule opens to a three-flight staircase modelled on famous French palace examples, executed in white sandstone, and lit beneath a false dome from which a large bronze lamp hangs. A monumental two-storey dining hall, today known as the Mirror Hall, rises from the representative floor and is fitted with tall glazed openings, sizable wall mirrors made in Paris and hoist-operated chandeliers.

The Mirror Hall contains three large windows that reach approximately 7.5 metres in height and matching glazed doors to the exterior, while the two great mirrors each cover around 14 square metres. Five crystal chandeliers hang here, lowered by mechanical hoists from the attic; the largest chandelier is composed of 1,097 crystal pieces weighing about 197 kilograms. Decorative finishes introduced in the nineteenth century include walnut wood panelling, neo‑rococo plaster work, colourful wallpapers and extensive heraldic display, including Hochberg monograms.

Interior fittings retain notable historic items. A seventeenth-century tapestry, presented as a gift from Catherine II, hangs within a stair-hall; staircases and wall claddings in white sandstone remain visible in the nineteenth-century stair-hall. The reconstructed imperial apartments on the ground floor were completed between 1999 and 2005, presented with neo‑Gothic vaulting where earlier imagery supported that treatment.

Measured and catalogued elements underline the scale of the complex. The museum occupies nearly 3,000 square metres of exhibition space, while the building contains nine external entrance doors, some 140 tall internal double doors and approximately 195 windows. Conservation work has preserved a very large portion of the furnishings; roughly four fifths of the interior fittings survive in an original or near-original condition reflecting the appearance around the turn of the nineteenth to twentieth centuries.