Grand Prior's Palace, Baroque palace in Malá Strana, Czech Republic.
The Grand Prior's Palace is a baroque palace in Prague's Malá Strana district featuring ornate ceremonial rooms and grand staircases. Its interior showcases decorated ceilings and elaborate architectural details that exemplify the baroque style of its period.
The palace stands on Romanesque foundations, on the site of a house probably given to the Hospitallers in the second half of the 12th century. Jan III of Rožmberk made it the Grand Prior's permanent seat in 1516–1532, moving from Strakonice. After a Renaissance rebuilding before 1610 and early baroque work by Carlo Lurago, Bartolomeo Scotti led a large baroque reconstruction after 1725.
The palace's rooms with high-baroque vaults now house a café and restaurant, while the Maltese Garden beside it holds a large lawn and the memorial Beethoven Plane tree. In the palace's sala terrena and garden, the Artisème gallery shows contemporary Czech design.
The palace stands at Velkopřevorské náměstí 485/4 in Malá Strana, Prague 1, with the Maltese Garden and its large Beethoven plane tree adjoining the east side. The Artisème gallery of contemporary Czech design occupies the sala terrena between palace and garden. The courtyard wings differ in height, the north wing rising three storeys.
The palace's rooms today house a café and restaurant beneath late-baroque vaults, while early-baroque and Renaissance vaulting survives in other parts. Above the entrance portal from Velkopřevorské náměstí is the coat of arms of Grand Prior Gundakar Popp of Dietrichstein, who commissioned the baroque rebuilding.
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