Průhonice park and château

Walking through Průhonice Park on one of the visitor circuits is like being in the middle of a work of art. You will be enchanted by the beautiful harmonious environment, in which the layout of the landscape and the variability of trees in different seasons have been skilfully used. At the turn of spring and summer, thousands of rhododendrons bloom here.  

The harmonious and sophisticated arrangement of the park without disturbing elements is the result of the lifelong efforts of the park’s founder, Count Arnošt Emanuel Silva-Tarouca and his successors. The landscape architect had 250 hectares of land at his disposal from 1885 and was bound only by his own ideas and plans. He was able to work on his work for an incredible 50 years, thus creating the last great free landscape work not only in this country, but also in the world.  

• Interesting fact: Průhonice Park and its plant collections were added to the UNESCO list in 2010, along with the historic centre of Prague, which had been a World Heritage Site since 1992.  

Part of the complex is the Průhonice Botanical Garden with collections of irises, peonies, daylilies, roses and rhododendrons. The local collection of pine cones, which is used for study purposes, is one of the largest in the world. The park is valuable not only from an art-historical point of view, but also as a collection of native and exotic trees. Průhonice has become the gateway to Bohemia and Europefor many tree species that are now commonly grown in our gardens.  

The classicist château is not open to the public except for the exhibitions and the Visitor Centre. It houses the Botanical Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, which is engaged in scientific research on plants. 

Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, more precisely The Institute of Astronomy also owns the nearby Ondřejov Observatory, which is one of the most important scientific institutions in its field in Europe. During a guided tour you will also see the historic Art Nouveau building or the largest telescope in Bohemia. A stone’s throw from Ondřejov lies Hrusice with the Josef Lada Memorial, where Josef Lada lived and worked. There are 25 km of paths leading through Průhonice Park. You can give your aching feet a rest in neighbouring Čestlice, where the largest water park in the Czech Republic – Aquapalace Praha is located.