Bonga Castle

The Bonga Castle is an exciting, even peculiar sight in the heart of the idyllic small town of Loviisa. Nearly two hundred of famous Finnish artist Riitta Nelimarkka´s works are displayed there: drawings, aquarelles, graphic art, collages, woolen and flax reliefs, textile pictures, paintings, glassworks, art and poetry books, photographs and animated films, the latest from the year 2023.

In 1987 the estate came into its present owners Riitta Nelimarkka and Jaakko Seeck. The church-side wing of the big main building now serves as atelier and production spaces. The south-side of the building has been renovated into an art museum-gallery that is open to the public.

Bonga castle is itself a person, a myrtle philosopher standing on stone feet. Its silence is magical, but it is equally lovable when the whole edifice and gardens are filled with friends, visitors, musicians… With adults, youths and children. Actually it is always precisely then that its most beautiful flowers burst into bloom.

The original design of the Bonga Castle was made by Mr. Th. Hjelt, an architect from Helsinki. After the Finnish civil war, the house ended up owned by the Baumgartner family. Its Jugendstil from with its red roofed towels was modified according to the design of architect Hilding Ekelund into a granite castle along the lines of Italian neo-Classicism and functionalism.