Despite the existence of numerous and valuable works of Baroque architecture (manors, palaces, churches, chapels) and urban planning (Baroque-Classicist plan of Bjelovar, Baroque renovation of the Osijek Tvrđa – Fortress, urban transformations of numerous Middle Age and Renaissance towns), landscape architecture in Croatia was modest and scarce due to the unstable political situation and poverty after the Ottoman wars. In the first half of the 18th century, after the liberation of Slavonia from Ottoman domination, the first tasks were renewal of economy, establishment of political organisation of counties, renewal of social and cultural life, restoration of towns after centuries of stagnation, construction of manors and revival of feudal estates. In these circumstances, Baroque parks were compelled to await better times, and when those finally came a century later, after the fall of Napoleon I in the second decade of the 19th century, Baroque landscape culture was replaced by Biedermeier and Romantic culture. By that time, landscape-Romantic parks were common in Europe and were highly accepted as an expression of new fashion in Northern Croatia in the course of the 19th century. Baroque landscape architecture in Croatia is present in manor parks, bishops’ parks, public city parks and spa gardens. The Maksimir park in Zagreb (Baroque phase 1787–1794), the parks of the manors in Valpovo and Gornja Bistra, and the spa garden in Stubičke Toplice are the most valuable Baroque realizations of landscape architecture in Croatia. Maksimilijan Vrhovac, the bishop of Zagreb (1752–1827), was the greatest promoter of the ideas of Baroque parks in Croatia in the late 18th century. He was familiar with European ideas of landscape architecture and brought them to Croatia by building parks of Baroque and Classicist arrangement complemented with landscape ideas already transferred from England to European countries. Thus, it was Vrhovac’s special merit that Croatia has become one of the European countries with early park culture of the Age of Enlightenment. His landscape architecture realizations encouraged numerous owners of palaces in Zagreb, country houses in the vicinity of Zagreb and manors in Northern Croatia to design their own parks as well. Vrhovac’s parks were realized rather early considering the developments in Europe, especially public parks – the Maksimir park in Zagreb and the spa garden in Stubičke Toplice. Many famous public parks or spa gardens in Europe were designed after Maksimir and Stubičke Toplice.
Yearbook of the Society for 18th Century Studies on South Eastern Europe, 5, 5 p. 99-117