Ten centuries of European architecture & heritage
Josef Mocker (1835-99) was the architect who, more than any other, embodied the spirit of the Gothic Revival in Bohemia. His vast legacy includes major additions to at least twenty existing buildings, among them St...
In 1929, to commemorate the millennial of the martyrdom of St Wenceslas, three major commissions were undertaken for the Catholic Church in Prague. The cathedral of St Vitus – begun in the 14th century –...
In the early 1930s, a group of Prague architects, inspired by the Bauhaus movement (and particularly by the Stuttgart Weissenhofsiedlung of 1927), decided to set up a similar model housing estate in the neighbourhood of...
If the imposing Hotel International in the northern quarter of Dejvice momentarily calls to mind the buildings of downtown New York, that’s deliberate: Stalin’s personal approval of this architectural style was based on his desire...
This plot in Wenceslas square has a fascinating pedigree. In 1396, shortly after Charles IV founded the New Town, a brewery stood here, strategically placed halfway along what was then the horsemarket. By 1600, a...
The Strahov monastery has been home to the order of Premonstratensians (White Canons) since 1143, and to the relics of Saint Norbert – the order’s founder – since 1627. The complex of buildings is remarkable...
Devotees of Pablo Neruda, the Chilean Nobel Prize winner, will be aware that he adopted his pen-name in homage to the earlier Czech poet Jan Neruda, who spent his formative years at the baroque House...
‘U tři seker’ (The Three Axes) is one of several houses on this street in Prague’s Castle District to retain their original house signs. This one refers to the story that a carpenter once lived...
Madonna and Child with the attributes of Justice: stucco decoration on the facade of the house ‘U zrcadla’ (The Mirror), dating from 1729. Enthroned beneath a gilded baldachin, the Queen of Heaven cradles the Christ...
‘D[ominus] Matthias El[ectus] Rom[anus] Imp[erator] S[emper] Aug[ustus] Hung[ariae] Boh[emiae] Rex etc. F[ieri] F[ecit] An[n]o MDCXIV’ ‘Master Matthias, elected Roman Emperor, forever August, King of Hungary, Bohemia etc., ordered this to be built in the year...
