Dear YOU,
yes, admittedly: they were a bit over the top with their crush on chinoiserie, Frederick the Great and his court. But you can't deny there is a big element of surprise when you walk through the wonderful parks of Sanssoucis in Potsdam and suddenly you stand in front of the Chinese Teahouse:
On the roof sits a big Chinese Mandarin with a parasol - both in pure gold! The golden figures of musicians and tea-drinkers in Chinese costumes are as the 18-century artists THOUGHT they might have looked (I was to polite to take pictures of the vast crowd of foreign guests from Asia, who took photos bowing often, I suspect to hide their supressed bouts of laughter...)
Inside you find a beautiful hall with little niches for a cozy tete à tete - or look at the artfully painted walls and ceilings:
And when you come home after a long hearty stroll through the vast old English park, with abundent red and gold colours of its own, and the crispness of the air has tired you out, and you climb into your bed and close your eyes, then, suddenly, you realize the genius of the architects: behind your closed lids you see the uplifting sparkle, the unearthly glitter and shining of this poetical bulwark against grey-bare November-tristesse:
They captured summer - the colours of sunshine and light - something to dream of in chilly ice-cold winter's days...
