The Beneš Villa will open more to the public during the summer, accessible six days a week

Prague - The villa of Hany and Edvard Beneš in Sezimovo Ústí in the Tábor region will be open to the public six days a week from July to September. Visitors will also not need to register in advance for the tour. The site, which commemorates the second Czechoslovak president and one of the most significant politicians of the first republic, was previously accessible only during weekend guided tours and on public holidays. The government office announced today in a press release about the extension of visiting days.

From the beginning of July to September, it will be possible to visit the Beneš villa every week from Tuesday to Sunday, from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM. In September, the opening hours will be from 9:00 AM to 4:00 PM. In October, the building will be open from Friday to Sunday between 9:00 AM and 4:00 PM.

Visitors to the villa will no longer need to register in advance for the tour; purchasing tickets will suffice for entry. The full admission price will be 80 crowns, while children and seniors will pay 60 crowns.

"We are trying to open the villa as much as possible so that everyone has the opportunity to come, look around, sit down, and learn something about the history of our country and how significant a place this is. I am glad we managed to agree with the Hussite Museum on a suitable way to make the villa, through which history has passed, as accessible as possible," said Jana Kotalíková, head of the government office.

Thanks to cooperation with the Hussite Museum in Tábor, from July, tours of the Dr. Edvard Beneš Memorial and the Beneš villa will be unified. The newly created visitor route starts at the Dr. Edvard Beneš Memorial and follows through the adjacent park into the Beneš villa. “With the use of an audio guide that will be available, visitors will be able to listen to information about the presidential couple, the history of the villa and its surroundings, the exhibited artifacts, and other interesting facts at various stations in the upper garden area and directly in the villa," Kotalíková explained.

The extension of visiting days for the Beneš villa is not the only change this year. In the first half of the year, a swimming pool that was constructed in the villa's garden during a thoughtless renovation in 1977 and 1978 was removed. The goal of demolishing the pool and related construction work was to return the park to its original character as it was during the time when the Beneš couple stayed in the villa.

The villa of Hany and Edvard Beneš was built between 1930 and 1931 in the style of southern French rural residences according to a design by architect Petr Kropáček. Since 1990, it has been managed by the Government Office of the Czech Republic. Currently, it serves both for representative purposes and primarily as a memorial to the Beneš couple, who found their final resting place in the spacious English park surrounding the villa.