Plauen Castle was built around 1250 as the seat of the bailiffs of Plauen. From 1466 it served as the Electoral Saxon official seat, burned down in 1548, was rebuilt around 1670 as a secondary residence of Saxony-Zeitz , served again after 1718 as the Electoral Saxon official and court seat and from 1852 as a prison.
In April 1945, the large area was significantly destroyed by air raids, along with large parts of the old town. Cell tracts that were preserved continued to serve as a penal institution after the war and were only demolished in 2013. An archaeological excavation followed. In the future, the campus of the Plauen State Study Academy will be housed in new buildings on the premises , with the ruinous historical building fabric being preserved and partially rebuilt.
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Towering 52 meters above the sea, Bengtskär lighthouse is the tallest one in Scandinavia. The building started in in 1905 after the shipwreck of S/S Helsingfors and was completed in 1906. The lighthouse was designed by architect Florentin Granholm. On December a special petrol lantern, designed and built in Paris, was brought to Bengtskär and installed atop the tower.
German fleet bombarded Bengstkär in the First World War in 1914. Since the Gulf of Finland was heavily mined, it was not until 1919 that the surrounding seas were declared safe for shipping, that the light was lit again.
After the war the military value of Bengtskär increased as part of the defence system of independent Finland. In Second World War (1941) Soviet Union made a suprise attack to island. After a bloody battle, the small Finnish garrison emerged victorious. Intermittent repairs to the facility continued during the post-war period.