Nowy Wisnicz Castle

Wisnicz was rebuilt in the 1610s and 1620s for Stanislaw Lubomirski, who had the money to do it properly: a Renaissance castle enlarged into an early-baroque palace with a chapel and a great hall, wrapped in a bastioned fortification of the Italian type with five points and a monumental gate, the whole thing designed by Matteo Trapola. It is one of the largest residences of its period in Poland and among the earliest examples of the palazzo in fortezza idea in the country. Austrian sequestration, a fire in 1831 and the twentieth century stripped it, and it has been under restoration since the 1950s, so the interiors are partly bare and the visit is about the architecture rather than the furnishing. A Discalced Carmelite monastery Lubomirski built opposite was converted into a prison in the nineteenth century and remains one. The town below has a wooden-house market square and a small museum on the painter Jan Matejko, who worked here.

What you actually see

• A five-bastion fortification - Italian-type earthworks and a monumental gate.
• Early-baroque state rooms - the great hall and chapel, partly restored.
• The palazzo in fortezza idea - among the earliest examples of it in Poland.
• The town below - a wooden market square and a Matejko museum.

When to go

April to October. Half a day.

Honest expectations

Restoration is ongoing and rooms are often empty or closed. Visits are guided and follow a fixed route. The former monastery opposite is a working prison and is not visitable. Winter hours are short.

Nearby

Bochnia salt mine is seven kilometres north; Lipnica Murowana is south.