The Mansfeld building in Luxembourg City Photo: Shutterstock

The Mansfeld building in Luxembourg City Photo: Shutterstock

The Mansfeld building in Luxembourg City is now home to the government’s foreign affairs ministry but already in the 16th century it housed the governor representing Spanish rule.

Pierre Ernst I of Mansfeld-Vorderort became governor of Luxembourg in 1545, representing the mighty House of Habsburg. It wasn’t until the 1560s that the governor’s residence moved to its current location. Luxembourg by then had become part of the Spanish Netherlands.

The Greischs--a wealthy family--ceded the building to the king. Measuring 24x10 metres on the ground it was a mansion in its own right already back in the day although successive expansions and refurbishments over the centuries have given it a very different look.

The building’s history closely resembles that of the grand duchy’s, handed from one ruler to the next. When France conquered Luxembourg during the Nine Years’ War, it wasn’t long until King Louis XIV himself stopped by the invaded fortress city and stayed at the Mansfeld building in 1687. It would be his official residence when in Luxembourg.

The room where he stayed is now reportedly the office of the foreign minister, a post currently occupied by Jean Asselborn (LSAP).

Luxembourg would pass back and forth between Austrian, Spanish and French rule over the following century. It became the “département des forêts”, the department of forests, under the French in the 1790s who would finally turn the Mansfeld building from governor’s residence into the seat of the local judiciary, the Palais de Justice.

Peeling back the layers of time

The last representatives of Luxembourg’s legal system moved out of the Bâtiment Mansfeld in 2008. The street the building is located on is still called Rue du Palais de Justice and in common parlance the building is still referred to by this name.

The government in 2013 received planning permission to refurbish the building, turning the more than 5,600 square metres of surface area into a working office while also peeling back the layers of history to reveal the different stages the structure went through over the years.

A wall painting dating back from the 16th century, before the building became the governor’s residence, was discovered under layers of plaster. An optical illusion portraying several windows, the painting is believed to be the oldest of its kind surviving in Luxembourg City today.

The former exterior of the building was uncovered and sits behind the main entrance. The ceilings added later with their decorations have been scaled back to reveal the old dimensions of the structure, even if this does leave the stucco rosettes placed oddly out of symmetry.

Old fireplaces, door and window frames, and decorated ceilings remain in place as does a grand wooden staircase dating to the 19th century. Lettering of the building’s days as a courthouse has also been preserved, for example signposting the changing rooms for lawyers and judges or the court’s vice-president’s office.

One of the site’s most impressive features is the attic, a veritable maze of wooden beams supporting the roof.

The €35.5m works to renovate and restore the building took around four years to complete and the foreign ministry moved in in 2017.

Pierre Ernst I died in Clausen in 1604 in a castle that--unlike his namesake building in Luxembourg City--did not survive the ages. The heir-less governor upon his death left the Château de Mansfeld to the Spanish king.

The building became derelict and was damaged during the many conflicts that ravaged the grand duchy. Also named “La Fontaine” only ruins of the castle remain today.

A reconstruction of what the Château de Mansfeld in Clausen might have looked like Amis du château de Mansfeld, Becker Architecture, Bai Lheureux

A reconstruction of what the Château de Mansfeld in Clausen might have looked like Amis du château de Mansfeld, Becker Architecture, Bai Lheureux