Work on the park began in end of 18th century, when it was a landscape park with trails for strolling and a system of pathways, benches and bridges. The 196 ha park is one of the largest estate parks in Latvia, and in dendrological terms it is one of the richest ones, with more than 200 varieties of trees and bushes, including 127 foreign ones. The park encircles the village of Kazdanga, including the Kazdanga Castle and the territory to its north, where you will find the burying grounds of the Manteuffel family. These were established at the very beginning of the 20th century, but the work was interrupted by World War I. The park features leisure areas and decorative elements. The castle was built around 1800 by the European-level architect Johann Gregor Berlitz after a design by architect Giacomo Quarenghi. The ensemble included a Cavalier House, a granary, a residential home, a stable, a bridge across the valley and other structures. An agricultural school was opened in the castle in 1924. Today it is the Kazdanga Museum, with the local Tourism Information Centre.
The Kazdanga Castle park is huge (196 ha), and until recently it was owned by an agricultural school. Kazdanga is the birthplace of once-famous sour cherries. This variety has all but disappeared, but the park still features a few old apple trees, one of them with two grafted varieties of apples. There are old hazelnut and other nut trees, including a Manchurian walnut tree and a hybrid with a royal walnut tree. Recently, two royal walnut tree plants were gifted to the garden by selectionist Gunvaldis Vēsmiņš. Other rarities in the park include bristly roses, a rare variety of mountain-ash (a new tree), a gingko tree, a katsura tree, a bladdernut tree, a birthwort plant, wild tulips, and a wild maple tree that is depicted in the herald of Kazdanga. The aromatic garden of Baroness Lieven is being restored with lilacs, bird-cherries, magnolias, roses and others. An old “rose hill” has been restored with varieties of roses from Salaspils.
