Schloss Eggenberg and its gardens

Hans Ulrich von Eggenberg began the palace in 1625 and had it built as a model of time: four corner towers for the seasons, twelve gates, twenty-four state rooms on the piano nobile and a window count that runs to the days of the year. It joined the UNESCO listing with the old town in 2010, and the whole ensemble — palace, park and gardens — is one enclosed world half an hour on foot or fifteen minutes by tram from Hauptplatz.

The park is the photograph. A long lime avenue leads to the front, the Planetary Garden lays out clipped beds and low hedges behind the palace, and peacocks — genuinely, several of them — walk the lawns and roost in the trees. The formal garden gives geometry; the outer park, with big old trees and open grass, gives soft backgrounds without a building in the frame.

Morning light comes across the front court and the lime avenue; late afternoon suits the garden side and the west façade. In April and May the beds are planted and the avenue leafs out; in October the limes turn; in winter the bare structure of the garden is stronger than the planting ever is, and there is often frost on the parterre first thing.

The park is open daily and inexpensive; the state rooms inside are guided-tour only and run a seasonal calendar, roughly spring to autumn. Opening hours, tour times and the rules on tripods and larger productions are the estate's own and change — check them before the day.