Palace Museum in Wilanów

• Name — King John III Museum in Wilanów • Mapframe Caption — Interactive fullscreen map • Mapframe Zoom — 10 • Mapframe Marker — museum • Mapframe Wikidata — yes • Established — 1805 • Location — ul. Stanislawa Kostki Potockiego 10/16 Warsaw, Poland • Type — palace museum • Director — Paweł Jaskanis • Website — wilanow-palac.pl

The Wilanów Palace was first opened to the public in 1805, when the owners of the palace, Stanisław Kostka Potocki and his wife Aleksandra Lubomirska created a museum, one of the first public museums in Poland. In 1877 the museum was popularized by the publication entitled Wilanów. Album widoków i pamiątek... edited by Hipolit Skimborowicz and Wojciech Gerson. This was followed in 1893 by a guide to the palace and its collections. After the Second World War, the palace was renovated, and most of the collection, which had been stolen by Nazi Germany, was repatriated. Under the Communist agrarian reform, the Wilanów estate became the property of the state. In 1954 the extensive revitalization palace and the park began in 1962 with the opening of the museum as a branch of the National Museum, Warsaw. In following years the number of visitors to the palace and gardens reached 400,000 people per year. In 1983, on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of the Battle of Vienna, the museum organized a jubilee exhibition "Glory and fame of John III in art and literature". In 1995 the Palace Museum was established as an independent entity under the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage. The museum regularly organizes temporary exhibitions, conferences and seminars, conducts research, publishes books and organizes educational activities dedicated to both cultural and natural values of the Wilanów residence. In September 2013 the museum was renamed as the Museum of King John III's Palace at Wilanów.