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From humble beginnings in 1617 as a rural forestry operation at the foot of Austria's Leogang Rockies, to a new raison d'être four centuries on as a celebrated hotel and forest spa, Naturhotel Forsthofgut has a great deal to look back on. This is the story of a family, a forestry yard and a hotel, told across 400 years.
In September 2017, the Schmuck family, custodians and proud developers of Forsthofgut since the 1980s, marked the hotel's four-century jubilee with a look back at its foundations. As Christoph Schmuck puts it, "Only those who are aware of their past can create a future in the present."
The family had commissioned a chronicler to trace Forsthofgut's history back before it was ever a multi-award-winning hotel and spa, to the seventeenth century when the forest still teemed thickly on every side. The jubilee weekend, to which guests were invited, celebrated that history with the unveiling of an exhibition.
That was not all. Guests fed the deer in the hotel's own game reserve while Christoph Schmuck talked regional cuisine; hiked to the Lindlalm with Rupert Schmuck, rewarded at the top with Resi's traditional Almwuzler and the best Kaiserschmarrn in the valley; then relaxed in Europe's first waldSPA, wrapped around a vertical indoor forest, a 40 m² waste-wood sauna and a rock shower fed by the hotel's own natural spring. There was the Leogang Mountain Farmer Museum for the cultural view of the village, and a gala banquet where head chef Ingo Lugitsch cooked entirely from local producers.
Four centuries from a forestry outpost to a five-star institution. A family-owned Alpine hotel where nature-inspired design, a farm-fed kitchen and Europe's first forest spa meet in Salzburger Land.
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Get the insider news and lowdown on what we've been up to, where we've been, and who we've met along the way. Be the first to discover new places and get the scoop on our favourites.