It is also important for the urban layout of the city. It is an example of the Florentine Neorenaissance, en vogue in 3rd quarter of the 19th century, inspired by the Italian early Renaissance. This variety of Renaissance Revival was at that time one of the leading styles of the Berlin School, having influence on the Silesian architecture. The Town Hall also has artistic values, good proportions and carefully executed architectural detail.

Historia

Bystrzyca Kłodzka received the urban charter prior to 1253 and from 1319 it was a royal town. The town hall was probably built in the 14th century and was first mentioned in 1451. Already at that time it had tower. In 1475 it was destroyed in a fire, then rebuilt. It was rebuilt in 1540-1541 and then adapted for defensive purposes and crenellated. Around the middle of the 16th century stallholders’ were located near the town hall. In 1567 the present town hall tower was erected. The town hall was rebuilt in 1583. The crenellation was removed and a new, more ornate facade design was made. A year later a small mid-market block was erected at the place of the stalls next to the town hall. The town hall tower was decorated with sgraffito in 1603 or shortly after 1667, after reconstruction. Subsequent reconstructions of the town hall, most often the roof and the tower, were carried out after the fires of 1703, 1758 and 1823. In the first half of 19th century town hall consisted of a body covered with a half-hipped roof and a corner tower. The façade was decorated in the style of early Neoclassicism combined with late Baroque, with a rusticated ground floor and a net frame division above. In 1852 the town hall, except for the tower and part of the walls, and the mid-market block were demolished. The present town hall was built in 1854 according to the project of master mason Weigang in the style of Florentine Neorenaissance of the Berlin school of the third quarter of the 19th century. It is larger than the older one, it has a raised tower. The body of the building with a characteristic upper storey of the tower was modelled after the Italian medieval town halls. The façade decor and the forms of window and front door joinery were designed based on the early Italian Renaissance. However, elements of Neoclassicism of the 3rd quarter of the 19th century were also used in the façade design (decoration of under-window panels, structure and detailing of the body crowning zone). In 1936 the tower was renovated and new sgraffito was made on its two facades, painted over after 1945. In 1996-1997 the town hall was renovated. The sgraffito was reconstructed based on decoration relics of 1603 or 1667 and to the extent that was used in 1936. In addition, the external staircase (made of sandstone) was restored and the window and door joinery was replaced according to old designs.

Opis

The town hall in Bystrzyca Kłodzka is a brick, plastered building. Built on the plan of an elongated rectangle, it has a two-bay layout with a central corridor and a three-bay representative staircase with landings. A three-story building covered with a flattened hipped roof. A Renaissance tower is incorporated into its south-eastern corner. The front, south-western façade f the town hall with the main portal is framed by extreme faux avant-corps, of which one is the body of the tower. The rear façade is enlivened by a central faux avant-corps with staircase windows. The façades have openings with full arches in profiled frames. The façades with a plinth are divided by a profiled cornice above the ground floor. It is crowned with a beamed zone with circular loft windows (in the frieze section) and with denticuli and modillions. The façades are rusticated with voussoir over the arches of the openings. Under the windows of the first and second floors there are window panels with flagellum acanthus. The joinery of the first and second floor windows is more ornate, with a tracery pattern. The three-storey, quadrilateral lower section of the Renaissance tower is built into the southeast corner of the town hall body. Two façades of the tower are visible, pierced with windows and covered with reconstructed sgraffito. The upper storey of the Renaissance tower is octagonal, windowless, with clock faces, and has a flat roof. On the roof, at the place of the former helmet, there is an octagonal, brick, tower, surrounded by a gallery on stone rafters, protected by a forged, openwork balustrade. The walls of the tower’s finial have openings, including blind openings, and above them there are false machicolations with a cornice, which is crenellated. The ground floor vestibule of the town hall is covered with a segmented coffered ceiling with rosettes. The segmental vault of the corridor is decorated with a slatted stucco decoration imitating the layout of the vault ribs. And in the corridor wall, on the axis of the vestibule, there are three entrance openings, including one with a stone flight of staircase. The buttresses of all three openings are adorned with floral decoration. At the ground floor of the town hall one of the interiors is cross vaulted, and some, including local nature of the tower’s ground floor - with a sail vault. 

The site is accessible all year round.

Compiled by Iwona Rybka-Ceglecka, The Regional Branch of the National Institute of Cultural Heritage in Wrocław, 3 December 2015.