Manor House in Kulice

The manor house in Kulice, in Nowogard municipality, was built around 1848 by Bernhard von Bismarck, for many years the landrat of Nowogard county and the elder brother of Chancellor Otto von Bismarck. The building is entered in the heritage register. Since 1995 it has housed a centre devoted to Polish-German reconciliation.

A horseshoe-plan manor

The manor was originally designed in the classicist style, on a horseshoe plan, using the foundations of an earlier building. From the middle of the 19th century it was rebuilt many times, and the present building has no single style and has been enlarged with extensions. It is a brick, cellared building with eleven bays on the façade, a ground floor and one upper storey, and a gable roof with hipped ends. In the middle of the 19th century an arcaded entrance projection was added and the walls were covered with rustication, and in the second half of the century wings, an orangery and a connecting link were added. Inside, some of the old joinery and a wooden staircase supported on fluted columns have survived. The manor is surrounded by a park with notable trees.

After 1945 and the Polish-German centre

After the war the estate was taken over by the State Land Property Agency, and from 1949 it housed an agricultural combine with offices and flats. After the state farms were wound up in the 1990s, the site became the property of the State Treasury. In 1991 the successor of the last German owner of the estate proposed a conference centre supporting Polish-German reconciliation. In 1993 the manor was leased by a foundation. In 1994-1995 the building was under serious threat of devastation, after which it was restored, and the centre opened on 23 September 1995. In 2002 the manor and park were handed over to the University of Szczecin. Since 1 June 2021 the university's International Centre for Interdisciplinary Research has operated here, and the conferences mainly concern the shared Polish-German past of Pomerania.

Nearby

Right next door stands the former Protestant church in Kulice, and Lake Nowogard is a few minutes' drive away.

Practical information

• Address: Kulice 24, Nowogard municipality, Goleniów County.
• The manor operates as a conference and research centre; for the rules of entry and any visits, check with the University of Szczecin, which runs the centre.