Saxon Garden
The Saxon Garden () is a 15.5–hectare public garden in central ("Śródmieście") Warsaw, Poland, facing Piłsudski Square. It is the oldest public park in the city. Founded in the late 17th century, it was opened to the public in 1727 as one of the first publicly accessible parks in the world. History. The Saxon Garden was originally the site of Warsaw fortifications, "Sigismund's Ramparts," and of a palace built in 1666 for the powerful aristocrat, Jan Andrzej Morsztyn. The garden was extended in the reign of King Augustus II, who attached it to the "Saxon Axis", a  line of parks and palaces linking the western outskirts of Warsaw with the Vistula River. The park of the adjoining Saxon Palace was opened to the public on 27 May 1727. It became a public park before Versailles (1791), the Pavlovsk Palace, Peterhof Palace and Summer Garden (1918), Villa d'Este (1920), Kuskovo (1939), Stourhead (1946), Sissinghurst (1967), Stowe (1990), Vaux-le-Vicomte (1990s), and most other world-famous parks and gardens. Initially a Baroque French-style park, in the 19th century it was turned into a Romantic English-style landscape park. Destroyed during and after the Warsaw Uprising, it was  partly reconstructed after World War II. Features. 18th century. The garden was a typical example of the Baroque extension of formal vistas inspired by the park of Versailles. The park starts from the back façade of the palace, flanking a long alley with many sculptures. The central avenue lead directly to the palace, as was usual in French parks of the era. Following the completion of the Saxon Palace, the surroundings were included in the structure. The Brühl Palace and The Blue Palace, as well as the pavilion known as The Great Salon, were all raised or rebuilt during the  initial construction of Saxon Establishment during the reign of Augustus II. A baroque flower garden with pieces of turf, flower beds, hedges and trees was created. These gardens extended the central axis of a symmetrical building façade in rigorously symmetrical axial designs of patterned parterres, gravel walks and formally planted bosquets. The parterres were laid out from 1713 by Joachim Heinrich Schultze and Gothard Paul Thörl from 1735. View of The Saxon Establishment from the north painted by Bernardo Bellotto "il Canaletto" of 1764 shows a main entrance to the palace from Wielopole with The Iron Gate and the 21  m-high garden gloriette, so-called Great Salon.