Social & External
Catchy mix of farce and documentary. Portrait of a Berlin theatre company made up entirely of the homeless, alcoholics and junks. They call themselves ‘rats’ and take the film over to have a party.
André Le Notre is certainly the most famous French gardener. He was also a designer, architect, engineer, landscaper and urban planner. He worked for Louis XIV from 1645 to 1700 and designed the gardens of Versailles, Vaux le Vicomte, Chantilly and Fontainebleau, as well as the Tuileries in Paris.
The chateau of Versailles is believed to have been a dirty palace: a place where everyone tossed the contents of their chamber pots from the windows above… Yet during the chateau’s construction, Louis XIV had given thought to commodities, and several public latrines were built as well as a very modern water system. So where did this bad reputation come from?
Looks at the engineering of the Knights Templar, the religious order that marked the rise of the Middle Ages, and their amazing buildings in the west of Europe.
Whistlestop tour of Dartmouth in Devon, taking in the 17th century Butterwalk arcade and medieval castle.
I want to remain an eternal mystery to myself and the others ... The myth of King Ludwig II is unbroken even more than 125 years after his death. The 85-minute documentary, released in 2012 with beautiful aerial photographs, provides detailed information on the genesis and background of the royal palaces of Neuschwanstein, Linderhof, Herrenchiemsee and Hohenschwangau.
A building lost in the midst of a 5 000 hectare park, that's the equivalent of the surface of Paris, Chambord is the castle of all superlatives. Having required nearly 220,000 tonnes of stone to build, the Chateau de Chambord, in the Loir-et-Cher department, is an architectural gem. 156 metres of facade, it has more than 70 staircases, 282 fireplaces and 426 rooms. The castle commissioned by Francis 1st in the 16th century is also the most mysterious. The majestic monument has its share of mysteries: identity of its architect, influence of the Florentine painter Leonardo da Vinci in its design, location in the middle of marshes in the heart of the forest and even longevity because it has survived through time without being damaged since the beginning of its construction in September 1519.
An examination of occultism as practiced in different parts of the world.
Based on the latest technological and scientific advances, this documentary explores the palace's architectural past to resurrect Louis XIV's vanished Versailles. Versailles was an ongoing building site at the time of Louis XIV and continued to be transformed by its successive occupants later on. The Versailles we know today only vaguely resembles the Versailles of the Sun King. Most of its original features and apartments no longer exist. Thanks to the digitisation of thousands of plans, a team of scientists takes us back in time to explore this forgotten past in a new way, through a large-scale reconstruction project to bring back the Versailles of Louis XIV as he designed it, according to his requirements and dreams.
Filmed over the course of a year in an "upstairs-downstairs" fashion, this fascinating program provides a behind-the-scenes look at life inside Windsor Castle -- the world's largest inhabited castle -- via unprecedented camera access. Highlights include a visit from French President Jacques Chirac; the Queen's arrival for the Order of the Garter ceremony; and the high-profile celebration of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles's nuptials.
The Duplex A86 is a 10 kilometer underground highway buried more than 90 meters deep. This concrete tube, measuring the equivalent of more than 30 lying Eiffel towers, is the longest tunnel in France. The result of a succession of technical prowess born from the imagination of visionary engineers, the Duplex A86 allows you to cross all of western Paris in a few minutes.
Chambord, the most impressive castle in the Loire Valley, in France, a truly Renaissance treasure, has always been an enigma to generations of historians. Why did King Francis I (1494-1547), who commissioned it, embark on this epic project in the heart of the marshlands in 1519? What significance did he want the castle to have? What role did his friend, Italian genius Leonardo Da Vinci (1452-1519) play? Was he the architect or who was?
For over 100 years the Tudor dynasty ruled over England, and in that time they changed the face of the country. Featuring stunning aerial photography, this fascinating documentary gives us a unique vantage point to understand how this family imposed itself onto the very fabric of the land with battlefields, ruined monasteries, powerful castles and the beautiful symmetry of the era’s grand houses and palaces. Swooping above the landscapes and buildings behind some of Britain’s best-known events – places where Sir Francis Drake, Henry VIII, Shakespeare and Elizabeth I once walked – this beautifully shot programme explores history from a whole new angle.
Explore the treasures and histories of eight of England's most splendid homes on your own private tour.
How was a castle built in the Middle Ages? With which tools, which technology? Answers to these exciting questions can be found in Friesach in Austria's southernmost province of Carinthia.
Spain, 1961. Life in the small village of Torrelobatón, in the province of Valladolid, was turned upside down when the cinematic magic circus of a future Hollywood blockbuster, produced by Samuel Bronston, the rogue mogul of his own film empire, came to town: its inhabitants became participants and witnesses of the shooting of “El Cid,” a film directed by Anthony Mann, starring mythical actors Charlton Heston and Sophia Loren. Those days, legends came alive.
Ludwig II of Bavaria, more commonly known by his nicknames the Swan King or the Dream King, is a legendary figure - the handsome boy-king, loved by his people, betrayed by his cabinet and found dead in tragic and mysterious circumstances. He spent his life in pursuit of the ideal of beauty, an ideal that found expression in three of the most extraordinary, ornate architectural schemes imaginable - the castle of Neuschwanstein and the palaces of Linderhof and Herrenchiemsee. Today, these three buildings are among Germany's biggest tourist attractions. Dan Cruickshank explores the rich aesthetic of Ludwig II - from the mock-medievalism of Neuschwanstein, the iconic fairytale castle that became the inspiration for the one in Walt Disney's Sleeping Beauty, to the rich Baroque splendour of Herrenchiemsee, Ludwig's answer to Versailles. Dan argues that Ludwig's castles are more than flamboyant kitsch and are, in fact, the key to unravelling the eternal enigma of Ludwig II.
