Dreamed up by Frederick the Great and masterminded in 1746 by the period's star architect Georg Wenzeslaus von Knobelsdorff, the New Wing extension of the Old Palace contains not only the private quarters of the king and his successors but also a pair of dazzling festival halls from the rococo period: the confection-like White Hall and the mirrored and gilded Golden Gallery. Since September 2020, new exhibits upstairs highlight different facets of the king's personality and life at court.
Also on view is a prized collection of paintings by Watteau, Pesne and other French 18th-century masters.
Frederick the Great's nephew and successor Friedrich Wilhelm II added a summer residence with Chinese and Etruscan design elements as well as the more somber neoclassical Winter Chambers. Later his daughter-in-law, the popular Queen Luise, moved into the latter. Note her stunning bedroom with furniture by Karl Friedrich Schinkel.
