Lontzen Castle

En un regard

Le château en bref

Lontzen Castle, in eastern Belgium, is a late Baroque château with two wings and eight bays, built in 1746 to replace an older fortified residence. The site first carried, in the 13th century, a massive residential tower that was destroyed in 1288 during the War of the Limburg Succession; the fortified dwelling that succeeded it was damaged in 1702 during the War of the Spanish Succession, and the ruins were then cleared to build the present castle. Around 1845, it was remodelled for the owning family, who came from Eupen and had an oriel window serving as a chapel added to the north-west façade. Surrounded by a moat and approached by a bridge with a wrought-iron balustrade, the building has a square volume beneath a mansard roof with corner chimneys and contains some fifty rooms. A serious fire in 1970 destroyed the staircase well and the panelling; a buyer from Aachen had it rebuilt in a spirit faithful to the original. As a private property, the castle cannot be visited but can be seen from the outside; it appears on the list of protected heritage of the municipality of Lontzen.