Westerwinkel Castle is one of the earliest baroque castles in Westphalia. The closed four-winged complex was built in the middle of the 17th century. The castle changed hands several times. It came into the possession of the present lords of Westerwinkel, the Counts of Merveldt, in 1555 when Herman von Merveldt married Ursula von Diepenbrock, heiress daughter of Westerwinkel.
The castle was built in the middle of an English garden. It is a complex of moats whose origins can be traced to the early Baroque style and whose principles correspond to the moats of the castle in the Middle Ages. However, the moats were not dug for defensive purposes, as this system of defence was already obsolete at the time, but with an architectural objective that is representative of the Baroque style.
The entire complex extends over two rectangular islands, the buildings are on the eastern island, the garden is on the western island. Very striking are the different perspectives on the palace when walking around the historic complex.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.