Tivoli Castle

Tivoli Castle (Slovene: Grad Tivoli) is a mansion in Ljubljana, the capital of Slovenia.

The mansion is located in the city's Tivoli Park (part of the Rožnik neighborhood), north-west of (and visible from) the city centre, at the foot of Rožnik hill. It is the terminus of the Jakopič Promenade (formerly the Lantieri Promenade), itself the continuation of Cankar Street.

Built in the 17th century atop the ruins of a previous Renaissance-period castle, the mansion was initially owned by the Jesuits, but came into the possession of the Diocese of Ljubljana following the 1773 suppression of the Jesuit order. Used as the bishop's summer residence, it was surrounded with orchards.

In the mid-19th century, it was bought by the Austrian emperor Francis Joseph I, who in 1852 presented it as a gift to the veteran Habsburg marshal Joseph Radetzky. Radetzky renovated the mansion in the Neoclassical style, giving it its present appearance, and spent much of his retirement in it with his wife Francisca von Strassoldo Grafenberg, a local Carniolan noblewoman.

Twelve years after Radetzky's death in 1858, a statue of the famous general was erected on the plaze at the top of the stairs leading to the castle, guarded by four cast-iron dogs made by the sculptor Anton Fernkorn. The monument was removed after the dissolution of Austria-Hungary in 1918, and placed in the National Museum of Slovenia, but the dogs have remained in their original places.

In 1863, the mansion was bought by the Municipality of Ljubljana, who used it as (among other things) a poorhouse, later subdividing ot into condominiums. In 1967, it was again renovated and became the venue for the International Graphic Arts Centre [1].

An alpine-style building called the Švicarija ("Swissery", formerly the Hotel Tivoli) stands behind the mansion. The Jesenkova educational footpath behins alongside it.

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