Marienlyst Castle

Helsingør Municipality, Denmark

Open to visitors

The interior is normally open, possibly ticketed.

Strollie cannot guarantee access — always check before you travel.

Marienlyst Castle is a neoclassical palatial residence in Helsingør, Denmark, named after Queen Juliana Maria, the second wife of King Frederik V. The building originated as a royal pavilion of Kronborg Castle, designed and built in 1587 by Hans van Steenwinckel for King Frederick II, serving primarily as a venue for pleasure and hunting. In 1758, Count Adam Gottlob Moltke purchased the estate and commissioned French architect Nicolas-Henri Jardin to completely redesign both the pavilion and its gardens between 1759 and 1763, creating the structure and façade seen today. Jardin transformed the original parterre into an expansive garden à la française featuring symmetrical hedges, avenues, fountains, and mirror ponds. The castle's grounds have undergone further modifications, including the removal of a celebrated romantic landscape garden designed by Johan Ludvig Mansa in the 1790s; between 1919 and 1921, gardener Gudmund Nyeland Brandt replaced it with an eighteenth-century design to complement the castle's classical architecture. The gardens have been maintained by Helsingør Municipality Museums since 1930 and the castle is registered as a monument on Denmark's cultural heritage register.