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43-519: Plans for a new royal residence emerged after the assassination of King Alexander I in 1903 and the demolition of the Stari Konak a year later. The new king Peter I resided at the Stari Dvor, which had never been used as a residence but as a venue for state ceremonies and events. Since Stari Dvor was unsuitable for the royal family's permanent living, it seemed natural to think of constructing

86-462: A colonnade is a long sequence of columns joined by their entablature , often free-standing, or part of a building. Paired or multiple pairs of columns are normally employed in a colonnade which can be straight or curved. The space enclosed may be covered or open. In St. Peter's Square in Rome, Bernini's great colonnade encloses a vast open elliptical space. When in front of a building, screening

129-425: A liberal constitution of his own initiative in 1901, introducing for the first time in the constitutional history of Serbia the system of two chambers ( skupština and senate ). This reconciled the political parties, but did not placate the army which, already dissatisfied with the king's marriage, became still more so at the rumours that one of the two unpopular brothers of Queen Draga , Lieutenant Nikodije ,

172-450: A moderately liberal constitution . A Council of State and a second chamber to parliament were instituted. In 1902 Alexander's rival Peter Кarađorđević was proclaimed king by followers at Šabac , and Alexander responded by organizing a military cabinet and suspending the constitution. Radicals began to plot the King's assassination. The general impression was that, as much as the senate

215-472: A Serbian TV history series The End of the Obrenović Dynasty in which the royal couple was in a secret safe room hidden behind the mirror in a common bedroom. The room contained an entrance to a secret passage leading out of the palace, but the entrance was inaccessible due to the placement of the queen's wardrobe over it after the wedding.) The conspirators searched the palace and eventually discovered

258-412: A disreputable widow of an obscure engineer. Alexander had met Draga in 1897 when she was serving as a maid of honor to his mother. Draga was nine years older than the king, unpopular with Belgrade society, well known for her allegedly numerous sexual liaisons, and widely believed to be infertile. Since Alexander was an only child, it was imperative to secure the succession by producing an heir. So intense

301-664: A group of Royal Serbian Army officers, led by Captain Dragutin Dimitrijević . Alexander was born on 14 August 1876 to King Milan and Queen Natalie of Serbia . By birth, he was member of the House of Obrenović , ruling dynasty of the Principality of Serbia and from 1882, the Kingdom of Serbia . In 1889, King Milan unexpectedly abdicated and withdrew to private life, proclaiming Alexander king of Serbia. Since

344-465: A new one. The construction of the new royal palace for Crown Prince Alexander , based on a design by Stojan Titelbah , a prominent Serbian architect of the early 20th century, was announced in 1911. It was to be built at the corner of the Kralja Milana and Dobrinjska (today Andrićev Venac) streets. Subsequently, Dvor sa Kulama was demolished, when the leveling of the lot began. The cornerstone

387-456: A time upon the publication of congratulations of Nicholas II of Russia to the king on his engagement and of his agreement to act as the principal witness at the wedding. The marriage duly took place in August 1900. Even so, the unpopularity of the union weakened the king's position in the eyes of the army and the country at large. King Alexander tried to reconcile political parties by unveiling

430-410: A vestibule, the facade opposite Stari Dvor was given a completely different front dominated by a two-store colonnade of ionic columns , while the original frontage lines along Kralja Milana and Andrićev Venac streets remained unchanged. Consistent with the alterations, a new access to the east, park-facing side of the building was provided; and the heraldic symbols were replaced with emblems symbolising

473-484: Is 1 by 1 m (3 ft 3 in by 3 ft 3 in), made of special Japanese paper, and weighs 80 kilograms (180 lb). The Bosses were in constant contact with the king, who endorsed the designs and paid for it. The album was to be sent to Serbia in the summer of 1914, but the World War I broke out. It is not known why the king didn't ask for the album after the war, but he was already too ill and died before

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516-539: The Japanese and English saloons and the private suites of the King and Queen. 44°48′35″N 20°27′47″E  /  44.80972°N 20.46306°E  / 44.80972; 20.46306 Alexander I of Serbia Alexander I ( Serbian Cyrillic : Александар Обреновић , romanized :  Aleksandar Obrenović ; 14 August 1876 – 11 June 1903) was King of Serbia from 1889 to 1903 when he and his wife, Draga Mašin , were assassinated by

559-471: The Kingdom of Serbia , which subsequently was incorporated into the coat of arms of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia . The central motif of the façade facing Andrićev Venac was the curved projecting bay whose attic was surmounted by a monumental ornamental composition featuring the coat of arms in the centre. An integral part of the palace complex and the element that related Novi Dvor and Stari Dvor to one another

602-702: The Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. , (in style a peripteral classical temple) can be termed a colonnade. As well as the traditional use in buildings and monuments, colonnades are used in sports stadiums such as the Harvard Stadium in Boston , where the entire horseshoe-shaped stadium is topped by a colonnade. The longest colonnade in the United States, with 36 Corinthian columns ,

645-599: The Queen of Württemberg , for his son. He neither consulted his Prime Minister Dr. Vladan Đorđević , who was visiting the Universal Exhibition in Paris at the time of the announcement. Both immediately resigned, and Alexander had difficulty in forming a new cabinet. Alexander's mother also opposed the marriage and was subsequently banished from the kingdom. Opposition to the union seemed to subside somewhat for

688-805: The administrative seat of the People's Republic of Serbia . To connect the former palace complex with the National Assembly building, the fence was removed, the Maršalat building torn down and the palace garden turned into a public Pioneers Park . In 1948–53 Novi Dvor was restyled and extended to a design by the architect Milan Minić to accommodate the Presidency of the Government of the People's Republic of Serbia. It received an assembly hall with

731-523: The Maršalat building with two curved wings, and the parterre-type royal gardens with a fountain between the two palaces, gave the complex a formal and stately appearance. In 1911, King Peter I personally ordered to interior design from the German husband and wife designers August and Elsa Bosse, from Weimar . After working on it for two years, they compiled the two-volume album with 50 aquarelles, 65 drawings and 6 large blueprints. The luxuriously covered album

774-770: The National Assembly of the People's Republic of Serbia, the Presidency of the Socialist Republic of Serbia and, for the longest period of time, the Office of the President of the Republic of Serbia . Nowadays, Novi Dvor forms part of one of the most valuable heritage areas in the historic core of Belgrade. The main problem for Titelbah was the stylistic harmony of the new structure with the three decades-old Stari Dvor. Turning to historicism , he designed

817-548: The Royal Museum, subsequently renamed the Museum of Prince Paul, opened in 1936. The Museum was one of the most important cultural institutions in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the contemporaries rated it among the most modern European museums. On the ground floor were exhibited prehistoric , ancient and medieval artifacts ; the first floor was assigned for monuments of national culture and 19th-century Yugoslav art; on

860-621: The army. During that time, Milan was regarded as the de facto ruler of the country. In 1898 penalties were brought down upon the Radical and the Russophil parties, which the court sought to tie to an attempted assassination of the former King Milan. Alexander's attitude during the Greco-Turkish War (1897) was one of strict neutrality . In the summer of 1900, King Alexander suddenly announced his engagement to Draga Mašin ,

903-549: The case of the western porch of St Paul's Cathedral and the east front of the Louvre . Colonnades (formerly as colonade) have been built since ancient times and interpretations of the classical model have continued through to modern times, and Neoclassical styles remained popular for centuries. At the British Museum , for example, porticos are continued along the front as a colonnade. The porch of columns that surrounds

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946-419: The council of state caused increasing irritation to King Alexander. In March 1903, the king suspended the constitution for half an hour, time enough to publish decrees dismissing and replacing the old senators and Councillors of state. This arbitrary act increased dissatisfaction in the country. Attempting to appease the opposition, King Alexander granted an amnesty to the persecuted Radicals, and in 1901 issued

989-460: The door (Latin porta ), it is called a portico . When enclosing an open court, a peristyle . A portico may be more than one rank of columns deep, as at the Pantheon in Rome or the stoae of Ancient Greece . When the intercolumniation is alternately wide and narrow, a colonnade may be termed "araeosystyle" (Gr. αραιος, "widely spaced", and συστυλος, "with columns set close together"), as in

1032-400: The eve of World War I . The building suffered substantial damage during the war, especially during the 1915 Austro-Hungarian bombing. Occupying Austro-Hungarian army used the building to host soldiers and the woodworks was completely destroyed as it was used for heating. In 1918, during the withdrawal of the occupying army, the building was further damaged. After the war, a thorough rebuilding

1075-411: The event that the marriage of King Alexander and Queen Draga was childless. Apparently to prevent Queen Draga's brother being named heir presumptive, but in reality, to replace Alexander Obrenović with Prince Peter Karađorđević , a conspiracy was organized by a group of army officers headed by Captain Dragutin Dimitrijević , also known as "Apis", and Novak Perišić, a young Serbian Orthodox militant who

1118-418: The garden facade with the elements from the renaissance and baroque. He envisioned the towers with domes, but they were not built. Laid out as an architectural counterpart of Stari Dvor, the new royal residence historically supported the earlier concept of a palace complex, highlighting the need for rounding off spatially and symbolically a whole that connoted the very idea of the state . The three store building

1161-469: The king was only thirteen, three regents were appointed, head among them Jovan Ristich . His mother also became his regent. Alexander ordered the arrest of the regents on April 13, 1893, proclaiming himself of age and dissolving national assembly. On May 21, he abolished his father's liberal constitution of 1889 and restored the previous one . In 1894, the young King brought his father, Milan, back to Serbia and, in 1898, appointed him commander-in-chief of

1204-457: The main facade was achieved by a central and two end projections, and a curved , centrally positioned entrance porch. In accordance with the purpose of the building, special attention in ornamenting the façades was paid to heraldic symbols. The semicircular pediment above the cornice of the central projecting bay contained the full armorial achievement of the royal house of Karađorđević. The tallest and, consequently, dominant element of Novi Dvor –

1247-521: The major works were finished in 1921. Works on the interiors began in June 1921, and were finished in May 1922, few days before the royal wedding of King Alexander I and Queen Maria . Novi Dvor was the official royal residence from 1922 to 1934, when the royal family moved away from downtown to the newly built Kraljevski Dvor in more secluded Dedinje neighborhood. King Alexander I assigned in 1934 Novi Dvor to

1290-405: The mansion was fully finished. The ground floor contained a reception hall, a dining room and, in the portion looking on Kralja Milana Street, a suite for the accommodation of state guests, while the two upper floors were intended as the royal family's private quarters. As the blueprints did not set aside a space for a kitchen, the kitchen was housed in an adjacent Šumadija-type house connected with

1333-484: The new, republican, form of government. In decorating the interior , special attention was paid to the addition, which was adorned with works of distinguished Yugoslav painters and sculptors, such as Toma Rosandić , Petar Lubarda , Milo Milunović , etc. Since 1953 Novi Dvor has successively housed the highest governement institutions organs of Serbia: the Executive Council of the People's Republic of Serbia,

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1376-408: The royal couple and murdered them in the early morning of 11 June 1903. They were shot and their bodies mutilated and disembowelled, after which, according to eyewitness accounts, they were thrown from a second-floor window of the palace onto piles of garden manure. King Alexander and Queen Draga were buried in the crypt of St. Mark's Church, Belgrade . Colonnade In classical architecture ,

1419-479: The second floor was the collection of contemporary European art, in which domestic artists occupied an important place. The Novi Dvor housed the Museum of Prince Paul until 1948, when, under a Communist rule, it was assigned a different role . After the World War II , the reconstruction and new use of both Novi Dvor and Stari Dvor served the broader objective of transforming the former royal palace complex into

1462-645: The semi-basement of the palace by a tunnel. All of the interior decoration, including the sumptuous furniture, was done by the French firm Bézier, which was selected by the crown prince Alexander. Instead of the plain, German style, quite the opposite, exuberant style was applied. Special attention was paid to the interior design of the vestibule, the Reception Hall, the Dining Room, the Bosnian Room,

1505-408: The tower capped with a dome tapering into a spire topped by a bronze eagle rising – provided the architectural link between the facades facing Kralja Milana and Andrićev Venac streets. Another important heraldic composition was placed just beneath the dome of the corner tower: two identical, symmetrically placed shields with a cross between four fire-steels , i.e. an element of the coat-of-arms of

1548-523: Was ceremonially laid on 14 September 1911, and consecrated by the Serbian metropolitan Dimitrije . Titelbah personally supervised the construction, and Novi Dvor is the only known work he did as an architect of the Ministry of Construction . The facade was erected in 1912, and the communal works were done by 1913. By 1914, the construction works were finished, and the wood joinery installation began on

1591-490: Was designed in the style of academism with elements borrowed mostly from Renaissance and Baroque architecture. The most imposing facade faced the garden , and the corner took the form of a domed tower similar to the solution used for Stari Dvor. The horizontal facade division showed a rusticated semi-basement, the ground floor and the first floor integrated into one central composition, and an independently and more unassumingly treated second floor. The articulation of

1634-528: Was in the pay of the Russian Empire , as well as the leader of the Black Hand secret society which would assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand in 1914. Several politicians were also members of the conspiracy and allegedly included former Prime Minister Nikola Pašić . The royal couple's palace was invaded and they hid in a wardrobe in the queen's bedroom. (There is another possibility, used in

1677-442: Was needed, not only architectural, but also of waterworks, plumbing, wirings, heating, etc. Reconstruction was conducted under the supervision of a special commission which also oversaw the renovation of Stari Dvor. Among the members of the commission, which was in charge of the entire work on the new royal residence, were the painter Uroš Predić and the architects Petar Popović and Momir Korunović . Reconstruction began in 1919 and

1720-549: Was packed with men devoted to the royal couple and the government obtained a large majority at the general elections, King Alexander would not hesitate any longer to proclaim Queen Draga's brother as the heir presumptive to the throne. In spite of this, it had been agreed with the Serbian government that Prince Mirko of Montenegro , who was married to Natalija Konstantinović , the granddaughter of Princess Anka Obrenović , an aunt of King Milan, would be proclaimed heir presumptive in

1763-439: Was the fence with gates and sentry boxes, which separated the royal palaces and gardens from Kralja Milana Street. A similar role was played by the Maršalat building whose enlargement and facade remodeling in 1919-1920 was carried out by the architect Momir Korunović in such a way as to ensure consistency to the complex in style and layout. The gates in the form of triumphal arches with relief ornamentation and heraldic symbols,

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1806-523: Was the opposition to Mašin among the political classes that the king found it impossible for a time to recruit suitable candidates for senior posts. Before making the announcement of his intended engagement, Alexander did not consult with his father, who had been on vacation in Karlsbad and making arrangements to secure the hand of the suitable German royal , Princess Alexandra Karoline of Schaumburg-Lippe , member of an ancient House of Lippe , sister of

1849-530: Was to be proclaimed heir presumptive to the throne. Alexander's good relations and the country's growing dependence on Austria-Hungary were detested by the Serbian public. According to Heinrich Berghaus , more than two million Serbs lived in Austria-Hungary , with another million in the Ottoman Empire , although many migrated to Serbia. Meanwhile, the independence of the senate and of

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