The Frederiksberg Palace Axis

Søndermarken and Frederiksberg Park are the palace gardens of Frederiksberg Palace. Frederiksberg Park and Søndermarken were established concurrently with the Palace in 1699. Both of them were laid out as strict, symmetrical complexes extending from the palace. A straight line intersected the Palace and the Park and Søndermarken and this palace axis connected the two gardens across Frederiksberg Palace and the hill on which it sits. The fashion in garden design changed, and in the late 1700s and early 1800s, the parks were redesigned as English landscape gardens. Although the style prescribed winding paths and no direct view of buildings, the palace axis was retained in both gardens. Neither buildings nor plantings were installed in the axis. The Palace’s Italianate architecture and distinctive appearance is complemented by the Palace courtyard, parterre and cascades facing Frederiksberg Park, and renders the Palace visible at a distance to a beholder standing in the axis. Since 1852, the Søndermarken park has been completely open for the public to use.