Nederland - Haarzuilens, Kasteel de Haar

Kasteel de Haar (The Haar Castle) is one of the most visited castles in the Netherlands. Originally it was named Het Huys te Haer. However the current Gothic fairy-tale castle was built between 1892 and 1912 with incorporation of the large 15th century ruins of the original castle.

Kasteel de Haar was first mentioned in 1391 along a blind arm of the river Rhine. Originally the owner was a member of the “Van de Haar” family. In 1449 the castle became property of the “Van Zuylen” family through the marriage between Josyna van de Haar and Dirk van Zuylen. Several families owned the castle until 1890 when baron “Etienne van Zuylen van Nijevelt”, inherited Kasteel de Haar (by then the castle had been in a ruinous and desolate state for almost two centuries). In 1887 Etienne had married the French baroness Helene de Rothschild (member of the extremely wealthy De Rothschild family), which enabled him to rebuilt the castle.

In 1892 the rebuilding of Kasteel de Haar started under the direction of the well known Dutch architect Cuypers. It's his interpretation of the ‘medieval’ castle one can see today. The interior was rebuilt in a un-Dutch luxurious style, it was equipped with electricity and the former courtyard, covered with a large roof, was turned into an imprerssive central hall. The interior is luxuriously decorated with a large but incoherent collection of valuable antiques from all over the world.

In 2000 the ownership of the castle was transferred to “Stichting Kasteel de Haar”. This foundation worked to transform the place into a museum and event center. The castle has 200 rooms - although not all of them can be visited. A couple of rooms are arranged with realistic displays to show how the castle would have looked like in his days of parties. Nowadays Kasteel de Haar is (almost) open daily for visitors.