The large ornamental garden, the parterre, is the setting for magnificent garden art. It spreads out in front of the palace like a gigantic carpet (parterre de broderie). The carpet-like patterns are woven from expensive flower borders, various-coloured stone areas, lawns and austerely pruned boxwood trees. This ornamentation is reminiscent of embroidery patterns (French: broderie). Straight longitudinal and transversal paths accentuate the precise layout of this garden area. Select vases, sculptures, and foreign plants set focal points. Simon Godeau, a pupil of the well-known landscape architect André Le Nôtre, designed the garden. Thus the builder, Sophie Charlotte, could boast that she owned the first French garden in the German-speaking world.
Countless new gardens, which used the formal Baroque design (neo-Baroque), were created in France around 1900. This style also inspired Charlottenburg’s post-war design. The ornamental garden, destroyed during the Second World War, was redesigned to regain the lost atmosphere of the past.
