In Versailles
lived Marie-Antoinette and at Schoenbrunn lived her mom.
Schoenbrunn
was at first a second home in the countryside for the emperors daughter (MA's
mom).
Versailles
became full time the seat of government under Louis 14. The entire court lived
at Versailles in various apartments.
Emperor
Leopold I gave architect Johann Bernhard Fischer von Erlach the order to design
a new palace. His first draft was a very utopian one, dealing with different
antique and contemporary ideals and trying to top its role model Versailles.
His second draft showed a smaller and more realistic building. Construction
began in 1696 and after three years the first festivities were held in the
newly built middle part of the palace.
Few parts of
the first palace survived that century, because especially Maria Theresa of
Austria to whom the estate was made as a present by her father (who, himself,
had shown but little interest in it) had decided to make it the imperial summer
residence, after she was crowned. She ordered her architect-of-the-court Nicolò
Pacassi to reshape the palace and garden in a way of the style of the Rococo
era.
Versailles:
Beginning in
1661, the architect Louis Le Vau, landscape architect André Le Nôtre, and
painter-decorator Charles Le Brun began a detailed renovation and expansion of
the château. This was done to fulfill Louis XIV's desire to establish a new
centre for the royal court. Following the Treaties of Nijmegen in 1678, he
began to gradually move the court to Versailles. The court was officially
established there on 6 May 1682.
