Ten centuries of European architecture & heritage
The first Cistercians in the Czech lands were monks from Bavaria who settled in the village of Sedlec during the 12th century, In their wake came German prospectors who discovered silver in the hills of...
The area bounded by the churches of St James the Greater and Our Lady before Týn is one of the most well-preserved mediaeval public spaces in Europe. A significant trading place since at least the...
The construction of Prague’s ‘Hotel Central’ began in 1898. The work of three architects — Bedřich (Friedrich) Ohmann, Bedřich Bendelmayer, and Alois Dryák — it was built by the firm of Quido Bělský, whose name...
Humprecht Jan Černín (Czernin, in the usual German spelling) came from one of Bohemia’s wealthiest families, their fortunes enriched still further by the Catholic victory in the Thirty Years’ War. His great-uncle had served at...
This sumptuous late renaissance structure in Prague’s Malá Strana district was developed from a property owned by the Kinsky family. After 1623, on the instructions of the new owner Pavel Michna of Vacínov, it was...
Today’s Police Headquarters in Vinohrady (Prague 10) started life as the dispatching centre for the state energy provider České Energetické Závody (ČEZ). It was constructed between 1948 and 1952 according to a design by the...
The banks of the Vltava contain a rich heritage of industrial architecture, from water towers to breweries, from weirs to watermills. The island known since the 18th century as ‘Kampa’ (possibly from its use as...
The earliest gothic building in Prague, the Convent of Saint Agnes was constructed in 1231 on a riverside plot later known as ‘Na Františku’ (St Francis’s). The site had been donated by King Wenceslas I...
Embedded in a wall of the vestibule of Můstek metro at the northern end of Wenceslas Square is the little bridge (‘můstek’) that gives the underground station its name. The marlstone bridge, constructed in the...
Of all the work of Vojtěch Ignác Ullmann, perhaps the most outstanding is the building that today houses the Czech Academy of Sciences (Akademie věd). Ullmann’s grand neo-renaissance plan saw off competition from a large...
