Fredensborg Palace

Fredensborg Palace
Fredensborg Slot
Fredensborg Palace and its courtyard
Location within Denmark
General information
Type	Palace
Architectural style	Baroque, Dutch Baroque, Rococo
Town or city	Fredensborg
Country	Denmark
Coordinates	55°58′57.34″N 12°23′42.98″E / 55.9825944°N 12.3952722°E / 55.9825944; 12.3952722
Construction started	1720
Completed	1753
Design and construction
Architect	Johan Cornelius Krieger, Lauritz de Thurah, Nicolai Eigtved

Fredensborg Palace (Danish: Fredensborg Slot; pronounced [ˈfʁæðˀn̩sbɒːˀ]) is a palace located on the eastern shore of Lake Esrum (Danish, Esrum Sø) in Fredensborg on the island of Zealand (Sjælland) in Denmark. It is the Danish Royal Family’s spring and autumn residence, and is often the site of important state visits and events in the Royal Family. It is the most used of the Royal Family’s residences.

At the end of the Great Northern War King Frederick IV asked architect Johan Cornelius Krieger, royal gardener to the court at Rosenborg Castle, to build him a small pleasure palace on the site of a farmyard named Østrup. Krieger built the French-inspired baroque palace 1720–1726, and the King himself took an active part in the planning of the building and grounds, and followed construction closely. The man responsible for the actual construction was General Building Master Johan Conrad Ernst, who was also responsible for the construction of Frederiksberg Palace.

While the building was still under construction Denmark–Norway and Sweden negotiated a peace treaty, which was signed July 3, 1720 on the site of the unfinished palace The treaty determined the fate of Skåne, which since that time has been a part of Sweden, and ended Denmark’s eleven-year participation in the Great Northern War. To commemorate the signing of the peace accord the palace was named Fredens Borg (lit. "Peace's Castle").