Grandhotel Schloss Bensberg rises from the Bergisch Gladbach highlands as the 1711 hunting command of Johann Wilhelm II, Elector Palatine—a territorial sovereign whose 120-room baroque fortress surveyed the Rhine’s commercial arteries from its hilltop throne. The palace’s symmetrical wings, hewn from regional sandstone, enforced architectural dominance across a landscape where competing powers monitored river trade … Continue reading Schloss Bensberg: The Elector’s Baroque Command Post Above the Rhineland