Schwetzingen - Schlösser-Magazin

Influences and Models
The architect Nicolas de Pigage modeled the
building’s outer appearance on the famous
villas of the Veneto (e.g. Villa Rotonda, Villa
Malcontenta, Villa Rocco della Pisana, Villa
Forni-Cerato) and their Palladian imitations
in England (e.g. Chiswick House, Keddelston
Hall, Syon Park, Kenwood). The bathhouse
is the result of a thorough study of tracts
on architecture and architectural history.
Suggestions by Vitruvius, Palladio, Serlio,
Scamozzi, Alberti, Blondel, Perrault and Adam
were used, ranging from antiquity to the 18th
century. The bathhouse front was modeled
on the Villa Rocca della Pisana. The villa of
the Pisani family at Lonigo near Vicenza was
built in 1576 by Vincenzo Scamozzi, a pupil
of Palladio. It has a two-storey front elevation
and an octagonal tambour with a hipped roof.
Obelisks sit on the corners of the main roof,
a feature Pigage copied for the Schwetzingen
bathhouse along with the tambour and the
front elevation. Chiswick House in England
was another model. The villa, in its turn
inspired by antiquity by way of Palladio and
Scamozzi 4 , had been built in 1725-29 for Lord
Burlington just outside London. At Chiswick
House the impression left by Palladio’s villas
on the Brenta, was such that Lord Burlington
had a river diverted to run past his house, and
christened it Brenta.
Nicolas de Pigage, for his part, planned the
Schwetzingen bathhouse with an eye to the
existing Apollo canal. The educated 18thcentury
visitor of course, understood the canal
to represent the Brenta, and recognized the
inspiration. The allusion also characterized
the bathhouse as a private residence. At the
same time the similarities to Chiswick House
point to another function. Chiswick House
was not built to serve as a dwelling. It was
an expression of its builder’s cast of mind, a
place to meet and discuss art and politics. It
provided the host and his guests with a setting
for witty conversation. Chiswick House was to
4 Richard Hewlings, Chiswick House and Gardens, London 1998,
p. 1: “[...] to create the kind of house and garden that might
have been found in the suburbs of ancient Rome.”
III. Architectural Features
be a temple of the arts, its architecture based on
nature and reason.
Nicolas de Pigage was familiar with French
architectural theory, for example that of
François Blondel, and the French element in
the ancestry of the Schwetzingen bathhouse
should not be forgotten. Another of the models
of this private little palace was the Trianon de
Porcelaine, built in 1670 by Le Vau next to the
Versailles canal. The magazine Mercure Galant
spread an awareness of buildings of this type,
such as the Trianon de Marbre and Marly-le-
Roi, inspiring in European rulers, the wish to
own such a private refuge too. The bathhouse
is a typical pavilion in the French sense of the
word, its uses – to serve as the ruler’s private
refuge and bathhouse – modeled on those of
the famous pavilions of Marly. In 1687, Louis
XIV had commissioned Marly-le-Roi, a pleasure
palace surrounded by twelve pavilions for the
use of selected friends, as a refuge from the
rigours of courtly life. The King’s sojourns at
Marly-le-Roi grew longer, and eventually one of
III.
Fig. 2: Nicolas de Pigage,
design for the bathhouse
garden, no date, pen and ink
(Bayer. Verwaltung der Staatl.
Schlösser, Gärten u. Seen).
Fig. 3: The bath house from
the south behind the wild pig
sculpture by Barthélemy Guibal
(Photo: RPS, LDA, Hausner).
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