Three – wing building of the Olsztyn Town Hall with a preserved Gothic southern wing. Western and northern wings were constructed between 1858-59 and 1927-28. Presently a seat of a Voivodeship Library (Wojewódzka Biblioteka Publiczna im. Emilii Sukertowej-Biedrawiny).

 

History

At first Olsztyn was administered by a town head called sołtys. The city was founded by Jan of Łajsy and the town council was first mentioned in the documents in 1404. A present town hall building was probably preceded by a timberframe one. The medieval edifice consisted of solely one building, presently a southern wing. The Gothic wing was erected after 1500. The entrance to the town hall was located in the eastern elevation. On the ground floor there was a market hall with merchant stalls adjacent to the building. On the first floor you could find: a council chamber, an office of the mayor and a clerical office. In the attic there were, among others, a post and a police station. The town hall burnt in 1620 in a great fire of the city. Between 1623 and 1624 it was rebuilt as a plastered building with baroque decoration. Another renovation took place between 1767-70 and resulted in the replacement of floors, stairs and window frames. In 1825 Olsztyn became a seat of Royal Land and Magistrate Court. The market hall in the town hall was closed down, and the place was adapted to become a seat of the court. In 1829, because of the growing needs of the court, the city council was forced to move out of the town hall. First it moved to the former brewery buildings in the central market, later to a private house of the mayor Jacob Rarkowski. A cash office and a treasury were located temporarily in a minister’s house. In 1852 a baroque turret was demolished and replaced with a new one. The construction of the western wing was completed in 1859. The wing was supposed to be a seat of the council, however, the court took over the wing in a short time and the council was still ”on exile”. After Oskar Belian became a mayor in 1877, the construction of the third wing was being considered again. Belian foreseeing that the situation may repeat, decided to build a new seat for the court. After finishing the construction works in 1880, the council returned to the town hall. After the renovation in 1881 a private apartment of the mayor was located in the new wing. Between 1912 and 1916 a New Town Hall was built in the Upper Suburb. The city council left the Old Town Hall for good. The abandoned building was taken over by the Trade School and the City Library, which also occupied the northern wing erected between 1927-28. At that time an inner yard was closed with an arcaded walkway. In 1938 the town hall sundials were decorated with figures of a Teutonic knight and a Nazi officer. The Old Town Hall was then a seat of Hitlerjugend. A clock turret burnt in 1942. The whole edifice was burnt down by the Red Army soldiers in 1945. It was rebuilt between 1947 and 1950. Then its basements were filled up, pediments were disposed of in the southern wing, the roof of this wing was transformed into a hip roof. At that time a decision of resigning from rebuilding the clock turret was taken. After World War II there were: a library, a Registry Office and an outpatient clinic in the building. In the attic private lodgers had their flats. In one of these flats in 1968 a fire was started by accident. In 1995 after uncovering an outcrop of decoration in the southern elevation, general overhaul of the town hall started. It went on, including many pauses, for 7 years, between 1996-2003. As a result the original Gothic form of the southern wing elevations as well as a turret over that wing were restored. Currently it is housing the Voivodeship Library.

 

Architectural description

The town hall is a storied, three - wing building with an arcaded gallery that closes the yard. The gothic southern wing with an entrance portal in the southern elevation is the only non- plastered one. Parts of Gothic decoration and a little window of the town scales as well as remnants of the market hall are preserved on the ground floor. In the eastern elevation you can see a portal – window triad. The middle portal, framed with a double Gothic ogee arch and a single segmental arch is the former entrance to the town hall ground floor. The door on the right with an ogee arch and a segmental arch, led to a staircase and to the upper floor of the town hall. An identically framed window on the other side brought light to the market hall. In the first floor elevation there is a sequence of blind windows with gentle arches and three, quadruple Gothic windows, filled with-crown glass. In the corners of the building there are sundials. Decorative mosaic suns date from 1966, ribbons with hours are from the pre-war period. A sgraffito tondo with a folk motif by Andrzej Samulowski is the only decoration of the 19th- century western wing. It is a part of the Old Town Hall decoration created in 1967 and removed during the last renovation of the building. A turret towering over the town hall, designed by Urszula Madej-Kulecka, was reconstructed in 2000. It is a copy of a turret of 1852, which appears in documents. The clock is still missing, but the library is currently collecting funds for its restoration. Only the northern wing has a risalit in the middle part of its northern elevation. A walkway, consisting of five arcades, closes the quadrilateral yard, covered with a glass pitched roof on a metal construction.

 

Interesting facts

During the renovation of the Town Hall after the fire in 1620, it turned out that the foundation is so damaged that the western wall had to be moved by 2.5 m, which made the cubature of the Town Hall bigger. Moreover, a guardhouse was erected next to the town hall. Eustachy Bronisz, a burgrave, and Jerzy Koenig, a townsman, protested against the extension of the Town Hall. The other side of the argument was the municipality. It was claimed that reducing the size of the market deprived the townsmen of space. The Chapter of Warmia, which was to determine the result, dismissed the complaint of the citizens of Olsztyn.During the renovation, on 25 July 2001, a floor collapsed while floor fitters were working, and thus 16th- century basements were discovered. During the archaeological research the remnants of hypocaust, medieval heating system, were discovered. A painted inscription Biblioteka in the northern wing’s risalit is exactly in the same place as a pre- war German inscription Stadtbücherei.

Practical info

- opening hours Mon.- Fri. 9 a.m.- 7 p.m., Sat 9 a.m.- 2 p.m. (the opening hours of the library)- free parking lot for coaches – 350 m. away (Nowowiejskiego Street)- small cafe in the Old Town Hall yard

 

Bibliography

Rzempołuch A., Architektura i urbanistyka Olsztyna 1353-1953, Olsztyn 2005 Sikorski J., Stary ratusz w Olsztynie na tle dziejów miasta, Olsztyn 1999