Today, the building remains a significant part of the landscape of the historic Senatorska street.

History

The building of the former bath house and laundry was erected in years 1920-22, based on the design created by Jan Koszczyc-Witkiewicz, its original name being “The Bathing and Disinsection Facility built by the General Extraordinary Station for Epidemic Control”. The design of the building is reminiscent of a traditional Polish manor house. After World War II, the building was converted to serve as a guest house. Having stood abandoned for a number of years, in 1986 the edifice was finally restored and adapted as a guest house and restaurant. Today, the building remains in the hands of the Association of Polish Filmmakers.

Description

The building is located near the western end of Senatorska street. It was designed in the Polish national style.

Built on an L-shaped floor plan, it consists of two wings arranged perpendicularly towards one another, with the gable wall of one of the wings facing the street. The old bath house is a single-storey structure with a habitable attic, its corners supported by buttresses; the northern wing is covered with a gable roof, while the southern one features a so-called Polish mansard roof, the distinctive feature of which is the almost identical angle of both the lower and the upper slopes. All roofs feature pronounced eaves supported by decorative corbels. The surfaces of the roof are punctuated with dormers and oeil-de-boeuf windows. The building is made of limestone, its walls covered with plaster; all roofs are clad with roof tiles.

The entrance in the front façade is positioned inside a deep, arched portal; the façade also features a stone plaque which carries an inscription that reads as follows: “Jan Witkiewicz Koszczyc uzdajał 1921” (Designed by Jan Witkiewicz Koszczyc, 1921). The stepped gable above the entrance, adorned with small pinnacles, is reminiscent of Baroque architecture and features a pair of rectangular windows separated by a wall with rounded edges.

At the spot where both wings of the building meet there is an external flight of steps covered with a shed roof supported by low, stout pillars.

Both the vestibule and the hall feature a surviving sgraffito frieze incorporating both foliate and figural motifs.

The historic monument is accessible all year round.

compiled by Anna Sikora-Terlecka, Regional Branch of the National Heritage Board of Poland in Lublin, 20-01-2015.

Bibliography

• Record sheet, Municipal bath house, compiled by Jadwiga Czerepińska, Kazimierz Dolny, 1982, Archive of the National Heritage Board of Poland in Warsaw, Archive of the Regional Monuments Protection Office in Lublin.
• Kazimierz Dolny. Przewodnik po mieście i okolicach, Z. Nestorowicz (ed.), Lublin 2014, p. 186
• Kurzątkowski M., Jan Koszczyc - Witkiewicz. Lata nałęczowskie i kazimierskie. Wystawa zorganizowana w 100-lecie urodzin, Kazimierz Dolny 1981 [page numbering unavailable]
• Leśniakowska M., "Architekt Jan Koszczyc Witkiewicz (1881-1958) i budowanie w jego czasach", Warsaw 1998, pp. 199-201
• Teodorowicz - Czerepińska J., Kazimierz Dolny. Monografia historyczno-urbanistyczna, Kazimierz Dolny 1981, pp. 97,100.