The doubters are forgotten today

One of the most beautiful landscaped gardens in Europe is his workplace and his passion: Cord Panning is Managing Director of the "Fürst-Pückler-Park Bad Muskau" Foundation and Park Director. But the park, with its fantastic lines of sight that blur the border between Germany and Poland, was not always the gem that visitors find it today. "There was already a lot going on when I came here 25 years ago - but to resume this ping-pong game of aesthetic visual axes together with Poland was something very special." Many long walks and adventurous excursions through the wilderness and undergrowth were necessary, always in search of old historic trees and the historic stone benches that marked the lines of sight. "We were repeatedly confronted by border guards who held a machine gun up to us and asked us in the purest, most beautiful Polish what we were doing," Cord Panning recalls the early days with a slight smile. Even after two years, he still got lost from time to time, because where there used to be views and exposed old trees that gave the park structure, there was now nothing but wilderness. Today, when you walk through the incredible 830 hectares of the park and enjoy the unique views, it is almost unimaginable.

For Cord Panning, however, the park, which was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2004, has a completely different aspect to offer.

"Especially today, when structural change is on everyone's lips, I often think of Prince Pückler. All those who shook their heads at him back then are forgotten today, but Prince Pückler remains unforgotten. Today, we would perhaps do well to think in larger time frames like he did. Prince Pückler's visionary thinking in embarking on a mammoth aesthetic project against all economic reason fascinates me. The question is how we can attract such players to Lusatia again today. Space, freedom and opportunities await in this beautiful region. But waiting for these people is not enough, we have to actively do something to be attractive - also for former Lusatians who want to come back. What shaped this landscape is far more sustainable than the relatively short phase of industrialization, namely the interaction of people with the landscape. The arc stretches from the medieval pond landscape of the biosphere reserve to the Lusatian Lakeland after open-cast mining. 
You could almost say that the Lusatia region floats in space, there are no clear boundaries here and that is what is so fascinating. New alliances can and must be formed here, even across borders."

Cord Panning has long been at home in Lusatia. He always realizes anew how many treasures the region has to offer when he has guests coming to Lusatia for the first time. Then he is spoiled for choice every time. Should he first show them the park in Muskau or Görlitz, which he considers to be one of the most beautiful towns in Germany? Or perhaps the half-timbered houses with their picturesque cottage gardens, the imaginative density of half-timbered houses in Schönau, or one of the impressive monasteries?

But for his great professional love, the Fürst Pückler Park in Bad Muskau, the recommendation is clear: "The special features of Muskau Park are best appreciated from the edges of the terraces, when the park reveals its full monumentality, which is otherwise only known from English landscape gardens. And where the Neisse flows through the terminal moraine, at the English Bridge, there is a small bench from which you can enjoy the view particularly well."