The facade fountain at the Magdalenenklause in the Nymphenburg Palace Park in Munich shines in new splendor. The Bavarian Palace Administration announced on Tuesday that the restoration could be carried out thanks to financial help from the Mooseder Foundation. The Magdalenenklause, one of four park castles in the Nymphenburg Palace Park, was built at the beginning of the 18th century by Joseph Effner on behalf of Elector Max Emanuel.
According to the statement, the building with its deliberately ruin-like architecture is one of the peculiar garden buildings of the late 17th and 18th centuries. These were intended to express the idea of escaping from courtly ceremonies into seclusion for religious and philosophical contemplation, simplicity and quiet enjoyment of nature. The Magdalenenklause shows remarkably early how Romanesque, Gothic and Moorish building forms are used in a historicizing way.
The chapel inside the park castle is dedicated to Saint Magdalene, as it is said. She is not only a model of pious penance, but also the patron saint of those who suffer from eyesight. The water from the well in the Magdalenenklause was considered to have medicinal properties, so that a pilgrimage to the hermitage developed as early as the 18th century on the saint’s name day, July 22nd. Those seeking healing could pump water into the fountain basin using a cast-iron floor lever outside the bay window.
Nowadays the well no longer has water. Nevertheless, this tradition is commemorated every year with the Magdalen Festival, which today takes place in the nearby Hirschgarten in Munich. According to the information, the wall basin of the fountain is decorated all around with tuff stones, imitating a kind of grotto or natural rock. Before the restoration work, many of the tuff stones were missing, and the actual fountain basin made of Tegernsee limestone also showed several damages.