Insulated without Styrofoam. This is how a building in Bytom was renovated

This is a building located at 17 Kochanowskiego Street in Rozbark, Bytom. The work has shown that insulating old buildings does not have to involve laying down layers of polystyrene foam.

Thanks to the work carried out, the building was thermally modernised, with the roof and walls renovated and the front walls insulated from the inside. The windows were also replaced and bathrooms were separated inside the residential units. Tenants also gained a new heating system.

The building at 17 Kochanowskiego Street in Bytom was built in 1920. Its renovation took 14 months.

The following installations were made in the building: water and sewage, ventilation, electricity, gas and central heating and hot water from a dual-function gas boiler. The building also underwent renovation of the staircases, cellar rooms and the front elevation of the building,” reads a press release from UM Bytom.

This is how the building looked in 2023:

The investment cost almost PLN 1.8 million, of which PLN 1.3 million was obtained in the form of funding from the European Union and a targeted grant from the Upper Silesian-Zagłębi Metropolis under the Resilience Fund.

We draw attention to the Bytom building because of the common practice in Poland of insulating buildings from the outside, without respecting valuable architectural decorations. We recently wrote about plans to insulate an old school in Pińczów, which is unlikely to meet a sad fate. You can read about the case HERE. Less fortunate was the historic vicarage in Warsaw, which has already started to disappear behind layers of Styrofoam. After the case was publicised, the conservator ordered an immediate halt to the work. We wrote about it HERE.

photos: Hubert Klimek, Bytom City Hall archive

source: UM Bytom