The village of Valec is located in the Karlovy Vary district in the north-west of the Czech Republic.
The first written mention of the village dates from 1358, when it was confiscated during the war by the Citbor brothers and Benes.
The small town of Valec is dominated by a chateau built on the site of a Gothic castle and reconstructed in Renaissance style. When in possession of Count Jan Kryštof Kager of Štampach, the chateau was partially rebuilt in Baroque style according to the design of builder F. Barelli and subsequently by G. A. Biana Rosso and its grand-scale Baroque reconstruction was completed by the Globen family in the years 1730 and 1733. Some minor Neo-Baroque renovations were carried out in 1895 and 1896. On April 2, 1976, the chateau was severely devastated by a fire, the consequences of which have not been remedied to this day due to insufficient funds.
An integral part of the chateau is its renowned vast park, which was founded and modified in two phases just as the chateau. During the second phase, the park received its well-known gallery of statues by Matyáš Bernard Braun, of which 27 have been preserved. Valec thus owns the second largest set of statue copies of the renowned artist after Špork's Kuks Chateau (
visit link) in eastern Bohemia.