The PKP Warszawa Powiśle station is one of the capital’s most fascinating examples of post-war modernist architecture. The building was designed by the architects behind Warsaw Central Station as one of the stops on Warsaw’s cross-city line. Its avant-garde forms and design features immediately gained recognition in the world of architecture. Despite this, almost all the buildings designed by the architectural duo Romanowicz and Szymaniak quickly fell into disrepair, and until recently it was difficult to appreciate them beneath layers of grime and unauthorised extensions.
The station was initially planned to be called Warszawa Skarpa, due to its location halfway up the escarpment between two districts – Powiśle and Śródmieście. It was built between 1954 and 1963 to a design by Arseniusz Romanowicz and Piotr Szymaniak, which envisaged the additional use of the platforms for pedestrian access between the two districts. During its construction, some of the historic Neo-Renaissance pavilions by the Poniatowski Bridge viaduct were demolished; however, this was to some extent offset by the high architectural quality of the new building and its striking forms.
The lower pavilion of Warsaw Powiśle station, 1963. Source: Museum of Modern Art in Warsaw, photo: Tadeusz Zagoździński
The upper pavilion of Powiśle, facing Aleje Jerozolimskie, was covered by a surface stretched between two arches. This shape allowed for optimal illumination of the interiors with both direct and reflected daylight; it also created a natural gutter from the roof, whilst the entire building resembled a kite. The shape of the roof itself, as well as the station platforms with their distinctive roofing in the shape of a steel letter ‘X’ repeating itself above the railway tracks, were designed to contrast with the historic buildings of the Poniatowski Viaduct standing right next to them. The upper pavilion has been renovated and continues to serve as a ticket office and waiting area.
Powiśle Railway Station. View from Aleje Jerozolimskie of the upper ticket hall in 2004 and 2010. Photo: Mirosław Szewczyk/Tu było, tu stało i Panek, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
The lower pavilion was covered with an inverted dome shaped like a fragment of a sphere, which led some to liken the structure to a spaceship. The shape of the roof was intended to echo the arches of the bridge. A few years ago, the pavilion was renovated and converted into the trendy café-club ‘Warszawa Powiśle’.
The former lower ticket office pavilion in 2007 and today. Photo: Jerzy Kociatkiewicz/Flickr, Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0 and Cyrkiel-network, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
The hyperbolic paraboloid on which the PKP Powiśle structure is based alludes to the ‘pure construction’ movement within which the project’s designers worked. Werner Huber, a Swiss architect and architectural critic, described the railway stations and stops designed in Warsaw by Romanowicz and Szymianiak in the Modernist style as “pearls on the rails”.
Warsaw Powiśle in 1963 and 2007. Photo: Museum of Warsaw and Błażej Pindor, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
In 2021, PKP PLK signed a contract for the design of two new stops to replace Warsaw Powiśle. One of them will be built at the de Gaulle roundabout, and the other between Solec Street and Wybrzeże Kościuszkowskie. The infrastructure of the modernist station is to be preserved and will be used for pedestrian traffic.
Source: ekartkazwarszawy.pl, tubylotustalo.pl
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