Marienthal Castle

The Marienthaler Schlösschen in the Schweina district of the Thuringian town of Bad Liebenstein is a local architectural monument and one of the most important places where Fröbel worked.

The castle was designed in the late 15th century as a two-story, strictly symmetrical, classicist building for use as a court estate, but in the 16th century its new owner remodeled it into a palatial manor house in the Renaissance style. In the following centuries, the castle changed hands frequently until it was taken over by the finance chamber of the Duchy of Saxony-Meiningen in 1833 and made available to Froebel as his residence and place of work in 1850.

In the same year, Fröbel founded the world's first school for kindergarten teachers - the "Institute for the Unification of All Sides of Life through the Development and Education of the Human Being", whose graduates spread Fröbel's ideas throughout Germany and the world after graduation. Under Fröbel's leadership, pedagogical meetings were also held and educational journals were published in the Marienthaler Schlösschen.

Froebel died on June 21, 1852 in Marienthal and was buried in Schweina. A memorial plaque on the house commemorates him today.

In 1924, Walter Gropius, the founder of the Bauhaus movement and influenced by Fröbel's work, submitted plans for a meeting and seminar center with a research institute, kindergarten and retirement home for former kindergarten teachers. Unfortunately, these plans were never realized. Today the castle is privately owned. It is not possible to visit the interior and exterior. However, the Marienthaler Schlösschen can be viewed from the street and the circular hiking trail "On the tracks of Friedrich Fröbel in and around Bad Liebenstein" leads past the castle.