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Garden

The current garden is a reconstruction of the garden in Rubens's time. An oasis of peace and quiet in the bustling city.

Guests enter through the main gate which gives out onto the elegant portico. The garden of the Rubens House is right in front of you. It is not quite clear what this would have looked like in Rubens's time. The current garden's design is based on Rubens's painting "Strolling in the Garden" (Alte Pinakothek, Munich) and on botanical works from the era.

The pavilion, which Rubens designed himself, takes pride of place in the garden. Rubens would have probably given specific instructions about the garden's design and the construction of the fountain. In the seventeenth century the world continuously expanded. And Rubens was a man blessed with a healthy curiosity: it is almost certain that newly discovered plants would have had a place in his garden such as sunflowers, "exotic" orange and fig trees and plants from the New World, including potatoes.

The garden is a lovely, quiet, protected place where Rubens's children could play to their heart's content while their father took a stroll alone, mulling over a new commission, or with friends, while engaged in a philosophical discussion.  It is still a tranquil oasis in the centre of the bustling city.

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