In the early 1700s, two smaller residential buildings once stood in the place of the former Chernal (Festetics) Palace, both of which were in the ownership of the Nádasdy family. The two buildings were merged into one in 1766 and redesigned in late Baroque and Rococo styles at the request of József Kelcz, a lawyer at the Regional Court and a councillor of the Royal Chancellery. Count Imre Festetics, who had to abandon his military career after a major injury, purchased the building complex in 1802.

Today, he is hailed as the father of genetics. The building became the property of the Chernel family through marriage; they had been the owners up until the early 1990s when the house was nationalized. The street itself was named after historian Kálmán Chernel; his son István Chernel was a famous ornithologist who retired as the head of the Hungarian Ornithological Centre. When the building went into state ownership, Chernel’s descendants settled in Germany and the local municipality used the building as an emergency housing facility.

When the house underwent an extensive refurbishment in 2018, archaeologists found valuable 18th-century murals on the ceilings.The preservation of the listed building was completed to serve the new functions to be performed by the Institute of Advanced Studies (iASK), the new owner of the building. The house is now home to the Hankiss Archives and a library with an extensive social science collection.