Żywiec castles: Old Castle, Habsburg Palace and park

In the very centre of Żywiec, two residences of the former lords of the Żywiec estate stand side by side — the Old Castle and the Habsburg Palace, or New Castle — surrounded by one of the finest historic parks in the Polish Beskids. The ensemble is best seen together: the Old Castle houses the Town Museum, the park invites hours of walking, and the palace façade recalls the days when Austrian archdukes lived in Żywiec.

The Old Castle grew out of a small 15th-century fortified seat — a masonry residential tower with timber buildings behind an earth rampart and moat. At the end of the 15th century the Komorowski family turned it into a fortress with four towers, and in the second half of the 16th century into a Renaissance residence with an arcaded courtyard, attics and sgraffito, inspired by Wawel in Kraków. In the 17th century the castle belonged to the royal Vasa dynasty, in the early 18th century the Wielopolski family gave it a Baroque look, and in 1838 it passed to the Habsburgs. After a fire in 1870 the architect Karol Pietschka redesigned the façades in the historicist style — the way we see them today. Since 2005 the castle has been the seat of the Town Museum in Żywiec.

The Habsburg Palace was designed by the same Karol Pietschka for Archduke Albrecht. It was enlarged several times: in 1893–1895 a wing with a glass roof was added, under Archduke Karl Stephan a Mirror Ballroom, and in 1911 a central projection bearing the Habsburg coat of arms. The interiors were decorated by Kraków artists, and Karl Stephan assembled a large collection of paintings here. After the war the palace housed a technical school (until 2013), and from 2001 to 2012 the daughter of the last owner, Princess Maria Krystyna Altenburg, lived in one of its wings.

What to see

• The museum in the Old Castle: the arcaded courtyard and permanent exhibitions — the history and traditions of Żywiec, folk culture of the Żywiec region, archaeology, the region's birds and mammals, sacred art, the "Konfessaty" exhibition on courts, sentences and torture in old Żywiec, and an exhibition on local people in the struggle for Polish independence (1830–1945). Seeing all the exhibitions takes about 90 minutes.
• The castle park, laid out in 1712 by the Wielopolski family as an Italian garden and later remodelled as an English landscape park: meadows, old trees, canals with stone footbridges, a fountain and a rose garden.
• The Chinese House — an octagonal two-storey pavilion from the second half of the 18th century with the Wielopolski coat of arms, now standing on a small island.
• For children — a town stable with a mini zoo, a miniature park and playgrounds; in 2024 a brine graduation tower opened in the park.
• The Habsburg Palace — its classicist façade and the projection with the coat of arms are best seen from the park and from the courtyard between the two castles.

Practical information

Getting there. The castles and park lie in the historic centre of Żywiec, on ul. Zamkowa, an easy walk from the market square. Żywiec has a railway station, and the S1 expressway towards Bielsko-Biała and Slovakia passes the town. The park is freely open for walks and suits families and pushchairs.

Museum opening hours: Tuesday–Sunday 10:00–16:00, closed Mondays; the ticket office closes 30 minutes before closing time. The tourist information office in the Old Castle keeps the same hours.

Tickets: all exhibitions 35 zł, reduced 28 zł, family (parents and children aged 7–16) 100 zł, group (10+) 25 zł per person. Single-exhibition tickets are also available: Old Castle exhibitions 25/20 zł, sacred art 10 zł, archaeology 8 zł, "Konfessaty" 4 zł, folk culture with the natural history exhibition 20/15 zł. The Habsburg Palace is not open to visitors. Information as of October 2026.

Nearby

A few kilometres to the north begins Lake Żywiec with its beaches and sailing. Part of the Habsburg collection of paintings and hunting weapons, kept in the Żywiec palace until 1939, is now on display at Sucha Castle in Sucha Beskidzka. Further east lies the Orava Ethnographic Park.

Official website: muzeum-zywiec.pl

Photos: Marek Mróz, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons; Lesnydzban, CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons.