Colmdorf Castle

The first mention of the locality Colmdorf, then called Kolbendorf, dates back to 1386. A wooden predecessor to the current castle was documented from the mid-16th century but was destroyed by fire in 1620. Margrave Christian Ernst gifted the estate to his wife Erdmuthe Sophie in 1662. In 1754, the margravial minister Baron von Reitzenstein acquired the castle. He had the old structure demolished and rebuilt in its current form by court building inspector Rudolf Heinrich Richter between 1754 and 1755. A few years later, Margrave Friedrich reacquired it and presented it to his second wife, Sophie Caroline Marie of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, after whom it received the epithet Carolinenruhe. The castle frequently changed hands until 1886 when gardener Johann Friedrich Popp purchased it. His descendants remain the owners of the estate to this day.