Kvasiny
- Classification
- Château
- Pays
- Tchéquie
- Région
- Rychnov nad Kněžnou
- Adresse
- Kvasiny č. 101, 517 02
The chateau at Kvasiny originated as a late Renaissance manor and is situated 7 km north of Rychnov nad Kněžnou. It has been a listed monument since 1958 and has been recorded as an immovable cultural monument of the Czech Republic since 1964. The original Kvasiny manor was founded probably sometime after 1608 by Bedřich the Younger Vlkanovský of Vlkanov. The manor is explicitly mentioned only in 1623, when his property was confiscated following the Battle of the White Mountain. In 1653 the manor was acquired by the Order of Discalced Carmelites from the Monastery of Our Lady Victorious in Prague, which converted it first into a single-storey Baroque chateau (today's northern wing). Later, when the demands of estate administration increased, the chateau was extended by two further single-storey wings. Apartments for officials, the estate office, and apartments for the Prague lords were accommodated in the chateau. In addition to the usual agricultural buildings and baths, the manor also had a brewery. In the second half of the 18th century the nucleus of the present park probably came into being to the west of the chateau. After the dissolution of the Carmelite order by Emperor Joseph II after 1786, the religious fund assumed management of the estate but did not maintain the chateau. In 1824 Antonín Slivka of Slivice purchased the estate, and together with his sister Anna began alterations and reconstruction of the chateau in the spirit of late Classicism. A low second floor with a wooden turret was added to the main building, and attic half-storeys were built over the eastern and southern wings. Under the new owner Josef Huppmann de Valbela, a pseudo-historicist single-storey building with a so-called hunting hall was added to the north-western corner of the northern wing in 1874. Further alterations, primarily to the interiors, were carried out around 1900 by Vilém Königswarter, when the rooms were redecorated in the late historicist spirit. The Kvasiny chateau was chosen in 1928 as the family seat by the inventor and entrepreneur Ing. František Karel Janeček. He spent the Second World War years in Great Britain, and after the war did not return permanently to his homeland, living through the totalitarian period in Canada. In 1948 the chateau was nationalised and adapted first as accommodation for employees of the Kvasiny car factory, then as a social care institution for youth. The establishment of a home for the elderly was also considered. After 1992 the vacated chateau was returned in restitution to the son of Ing. František Karel Janeček, Ing. Karel Janeček, who then gave the chateau to his daughter (and granddaughter of Ing. František Karel Janeček), Mrs Soňa Klímová, who is restoring the chateau section by section. In 2012 she created a very interesting gallery and concert hall in the chateau. The main wing now functions as an exhibition space, and the Chapel of St Anthony of Padua and the Hunting Hall may be visited by prior arrangement. Concerts, exhibitions, and other social events are held at the chateau. The chateau also has a nine-hectare English landscape park.