Maurycy Spokorny’s tenement house was one of the most impressive and characteristic buildings in pre-war Warsaw. It rose majestically at the corner of Ujazdowskie Avenue and Fryderyka Chopin Street. It was also one of the most beautiful examples of Art Nouveau in the capital.
The corner house, built to a design by David Lande, was founded by Maurycy Spokorny, director and shareholder of the Warsaw tramway company. It was erected as a profit-making house.
Ujazdowskie Avenue and Maurycy Spokorny’s tenement house at the beginning of the 20th century. Source: NAC – National Digital Archives
This tenement house was one of the first in Warsaw to be equipped with electric lighting (a power generator was set up in the cellar under the courtyard), lifts and hot running water. A garden was planted on its roof. The building received an Art Nouveau-Modernist décor with a corner topped with a turret (removed in the 1920s). Its façade was decorated with bay windows, balconies, loggias and light Art Nouveau detail. The top floors are finished with arches. The elevation from the side of Ujazdowskie Avenue was decorated with allegorical sculptures of “Fame” and “Knowledge” by Stanisław Roman Lewandowski.
The Spokorny tenement in 1904 and the same place today. Source: Digital Library of the Warsaw University of Technology and whiteMAD/Mateusz Markowski
Ujazdowskie Avenue in the early 20th century and today. Source: NAC – National Digital Archive and whiteMAD/Mateusz Markowski
The Spokorny tenement in 1938 and the empty space left by its corner today. Source: State Archive in Warsaw and whiteMAD/Mateusz Markowski
From 1910, the tenement was home to the architect Czesław Przybylski, who had his studio there. During the Second World War the building was burnt down, but its walls remained almost intact. The ruins were demolished around 1947 and replaced by a car park, a monument to Stefan “Grot” Rowecki and a narrow office building housing the Warsaw Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party (the so-called Small Party House). It now houses the Ministry of Justice.
Source: warszawa1939.pl
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