Schossberger Castle, Renaissance Revival château in Tura, Hungary.
Schossberger Castle is a one-storey, complex-plan château in Tura built in French Neo-Renaissance style, with a square dome, cylindrical towers, a semicircular arcade zone above the terraces and a palm house attached to one wing. Its steep roofs are covered with natural slate from France, and the 2,981 m² building stands in a 10-hectare protected park. The baronial coat of arms of the Schossberger family sits above the open carriage drive.
Tura belonged to the Esterházy family until 1873, when Baron Zsigmond Schossberger bought it and had a summer hunting residence built. Construction began in 1883, the year shown on the weather vane of the northern tower. Gyula Bukovics was the architect, as the Vasárnapi Újság reported in 1885; the long-held attribution to Miklós Ybl was never confirmed by Ybl himself. During World War II the house served as German and then Soviet headquarters and later as a hospital, and from 1973 it passed to a state company and was neglected.
Baron Sigmund Schossberger, who bought Tura from the Esterházy family in 1873, had the castle built as a summer residence and hunting seat. The northern tower's weather vane carries the year 1883. The interior was decorated by Róbert Scholtz, who also worked on the Budapest Opera House, which is why the castle is nicknamed "the Opera House's little brother".
The castle stands in the middle of a 10-hectare park that was declared a protected natural area in 2009. Since the renovation it operates as an events centre and hotel, and the building and park open to visitors only on pre-announced open days. The park is the main outdoor space to walk through.
The castle features an ingenious system of mirrors and transom windows that flood the entrance hall with natural light. This clever engineering reveals the technical skill that builders of that era applied to interior design.
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