The manor house renamed to distinguish it from another castle

Haus Velbrück was a castle in Metternich, a district of Weilerswist. In as early as 1325, the Princes of Metternich-Winneburg owned a water-moated courtyard in the area. The site was originally a two-part water castle with moats fed by the Swist river. Between the building and the stream lay a three-winged outer bailey. It served as the childhood home of Anna von Metternich and was brought into the marriage of Gerhard von Velbrüggen in 1545. To distinguish it from another castle in Metternich, the property was named Haus Velbrück.

In 1692, the last of the Velbrüggen family in Metternich sold the house to Franz Wilhelm von Schönheim, who also purchased the neighboring Burg Metternich that same year. The property was later inherited by Anna Maria and Kaspar von Francken-Sierstorpff, who rebuilt the manor house in Baroque style in 1720. The new manor house was a two-story plastered brick building with seven axes, architecturally comparable to the manor house of Burg Müddersheim. In 1800, the house was sold to a new owner named Schäfer.

The buildings currently standing on the site were constructed in the 18th and 19th centuries. During World War II, the manor house was destroyed and later demolished. It was replaced by a single-story residential building. The property eventually passed to the von Barton family, an old Scottish noble house also called von Stedman.

Today, the courtyard houses the seat of Velbrück GmbH Bücher & Medien with their imprint Dittrich Verlag. The site remains a place where the historical layers of a medieval water castle and a Baroque manor house meet modern use.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons