Category: Netherlands
The eye-catching Kasteel de Haar (De Haar Castle) is located outside the village of Haarzuilens near Utrecht, at the heart of the country, and shapes the largest castle across the Netherlands.
Its name comes from the de Haar family that received the original castle in place and the encompassing lands as fiefdom in 1391 AD, when the oldest record thereof surfaces.
Yet, it passed to the Van Zuylen family in 1449 following the marriage of Josyna van de Haar and Dirk van Zuylen but was largely burned down and destroyed during hostilities with the city of Utrecht in 1482.
As it appears, the castle was largely rebuilt by the mid 16th century but gradually fell into misuse and ruin following the death of Johan van Zuylen van de Haar without an heir in 1641.
The complex was restored to its nowadays neo-gothic style within roughly 20 years, between 1892 and 1912, as Étienne van Zuylen van Nyevelt inherited it in 1890 and the family of his wife Baroness Hélène de Rothschild financed the entire project under the guidance of prominent Dutch architect Pierre Cuypers.
It contains no less than 200 rooms and 30 bathrooms while it is nestled within a large park designed by Hendrik Copijn that features many waterworks and a formal garden reminiscent of the French equivalent of the Versailles.
Breaking through History 