Eduard Riedel

Eduard Riedel was a German architect, lecturer and government building official. He was born on 1st February 1813 in Bayreuth, Bavaria, Germany and died on 24th August 1885 in Starnberg, Bavaria, Germany aged 72.

Palace and gardens for King Otto in Athens, Greece (1850)
Propylaea (Munich) (1862)
Neuschwanstein Castle, Hohenschwangau, Bavaria. (1886) 

1813: Eduard Riedel was born on 1st February in Bayreuth, Bavaria, Germany.

1834: He begins to study architecture in Bayreuth and then graduates from University in Munich, the capital of Bavaria. Afterwards his first project is to supervise the building of the Ludwigstraße Damenstift (convent) in Munich. He then moves to Greece where he is appointed court architect and works on the residence and palace garden for King Otto in Athens.

1848: He begins work on the conceptual drawings for the grave of King Maximillian the Second of Bavaria in the Theatine Church, Munich (who dies in 1864). 

1849: He begins work on the reconstruction of Berg Castle, situated on Lake Starnberg.

1850: He moves back to Munich and completes the Propylaea City Gate project with Leo von Klenze.

1852: He is appointed a professor at the Polytechnic Institute in Munich where he stays until 1857. He works on the completion of the Casino on the Roseninsel in Lake Starnberg and also on conceptual drawings for the front of the Maximilian-il-Kaserne military barracks in Munich.

1853: He is appointed Superintendent of the Royal Building Authorities. He completes the Casino on the Roseninsel in Lake Starnberg.

1856: He begins work on the reconstruction of Herzog Max Castle in Munich. He completes the extension of Leo von Klenze’s building at Odeonsplatz in Munich.

1857: He designs the Royal hunting house near Ettal in Garmisch Partenkirchen, Bavaria. 

1859: He begins work designing the Bavarian National Museum in Munich (completed 1863).

1860: He designs the monument to the poet Wolfram von Eschenbach in Wolframs Eschenbach.

1862: He works on plans for the gardens at the Feldafing Palace on Lake Starnberg and concept designs for the new university at Karlsplatz in Munich.

1863: he completes the Bavarian National Museum in Munich which now houses the State Museum of Ethnology and works on concepts for a new university at Karlsplatz in the city.

1864: King Ludwig the Second of Bavaria had spent much of his childhood at the medieval style Hohenschwangau Castle, but at his accession he wants a new version built. This gives rise to designs for New Hohenschwangau which we now know as Neuschwanstein Castle. The overall designs for the new building are drawn up by the painter Christian Jank and Riedel is called upon to translate these into reality. Riedel complete the Mausoleum for Maximilian II in the Theatine Church in Munich.

1868: Construction of Neuschwanstein begins over the Pöllat Gorge near Fussen in the Bavarian Alps.  The ruins of two smaller castles on the site are removed to make way for the new works.

1869: The foundation stone for Neuschwanstein Castle is laid in September.

1870: Meanwhile he is involved in other projects and designs the Assumption Church in Saint Paul, Minnesota, USA even though he never visits the country.

1872: He is appointed as the principal architect to the court of King Ludwig of Bavaria.

1873: King Ludwig had expected the entire project to take three years but by now only the gateway of the castle is completed and inhabitable.

1874: Riedel is succeeded as chief architect of Neuschwanstein by Georg von Dollman and, as the project takes so long, later still by Julius Hoffman in 1886.

1880: The topping-out ceremony for Neuschwanstein is held on 29th January but construction is still far from complete.

Eduard Riedel died on 24th August 1885 in Starnberg Bavaria, Germany. He was buried in the Alte Sudfriedhof (Old Southern Cemetery) in Munich. In 1886 King Louis died by allegedly drowning himself and work on Neuschwanstein came to a halt only being completed in 1892.

Eduard Riedel’s work embodies the architectural fashion which became known as Burgenromantik (Castle Romanticism) which reached its peak in Neuschwanstein Castle in Bavaria. He studied architecture in Bayreuth and graduated in the Bavarian capital Munich in 1834 and not only went on to design new buildings but restored others and worked on designs for grave monuments and even coins. Much of his work involved restoring palaces in the grand style.

His influences came from a variety of sources but particularly medieval architecture. The throne room at Neuschwanstein for instance is modelled on a Byzantine basilica following King Ludwig the Second of Bavaria’s love of Richard Wagner’s operas which depict a Romantic view of the Middle Ages. This followed a long tradition in the nineteenth century to remodel castles in order to make them more picturesque. The inspiration for Neuschwanstein came from journeys that Ludwig took in 1867 to the Wartburg castle in Eisenach in Thuringia, Germany and the Chateau de Pierrefonds which the French architect Eugène Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc was transforming in Hauts-de France in the north of the country from a ruined castle into a medieval palace. Other examples of this movement can be seen in Germany at Hohenschwangau Castle and at Lichtenstein Castle and Hohenzollern Castle both in the state of Baden Wurttemberg.  

Riedel’s particular Gothic Revival style with its fairy-tale details and allusion to legends has been a major influence on later fictional architecture most notably on the famous Sleeping Beauty Castle in Disneyland in Anaheim California, USA. Despite being unfinished, Neuschwanstein Castle is still one of the most popular tourist attractions in Europe with well over a million visitors every year. 

List of main selected works by Riedel.