Erected in the 16th century, it was later redesigned in the Baroque style and finally extended in the classicist style, probably according to the design of the renowned architect Henryk Marconi. The building is a material evidence of the splendour of the royal town over the centuries, resisting the adversities of fate and the destructive influence of time.

History of the structure

The royal town of Koło was founded under Magdeburg Law in 1362 by Casimir the Great. In addition to the parish church existing since the 13th century, a Bernardine monastery was founded in the town in 1456 by the starost of Koło, Jan Hińcza of Rogów, which was rebuilt together with the church in Baroque style and consecrated in 1788 after being destroyed by the floods of the Warta River. From the 15th century until 1716 general assemblies of the Province of Wielkopolska gathered in Koło (the meetings took place in the refectory of the Bernardine monastery, moreover, the nobility gathered in the nearby meadows on the Warta River). After the fire of 1622 and the destruction caused by the Swedish Deluge in 1655, the development of the town, based mainly on craft and trade, was halted. Despite that Koło remained the leading centre in the region, being the largest town of Konin district in the 18th century. After the loss of independence of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the town came under Prussian rule, and in 1815 it was incorporated into the newly created Kingdom of Poland, which was subordinate to the Russian Empire. As in other nearby centres (e.g. Turek, Władysławów, Dobra), in the first half of the 19th century, weaving manufacture developed. In 1842, on the initiative of Józef Freudenreich, the first faience and majolica factory was established in the town. During the German occupation of Poland during World War II, the local Jewish population of about 5000 people were shot, deported or imprisoned in the Koło ghetto, and then murdered by the Germans in the nearby Nazi extermination camp in Chełmno nad Nerem (Rzuchowskie Forest) in 1941.

The town hall in Koło was built in the first half of the 16th century. According to the results of architectural research carried out during the reconstruction of the town hall at the end of the 20th century, after the collapse of its tower, a large wooden mansion was originally located in its place. In 1782, the town hall was renovated and redesigned in the Baroque style. According to the preserved iconography from 1829, it was erected on an elongated rectangular floor plan with a façade on the north side and a tall tower topped with a baroque cupola situated in the northwestern part of the building, cuboid in its lower part and octagonal above the ridge. The corners of the town hall were reinforced with massive buttresses. In the years 1835-1837 it was expanded in classicist style, probably according to the design of architect Henryk Marconi. The main body of the town hall was supplemented with a three-axis north wing and a one-axis south wing with an additional wall extending it to the length of the north wing. The north wing and the wall extending the south wing were connected by a high wall with an entrance gate, thus creating the town hall’s inner courtyard. The eastern elevation of the building was supplemented with a four-column portico, through which the main entrance to the building, with a balcony on the second floor, now led. Roofs were lowered and the Baroque tower cupola was removed, and it was crowned with a corbel cornice. Corner buttresses were removed. The elevations of both the old body and the new wings were plastered and decorated with rustication and string course. On 25 May 1987, the town hall suffered a building disaster - the Gothic tower of the town hall collapsed, destroying the south wing. After the reconstruction of the destroyed wing, the Town Hall in Koło resumed its activities. The reconstruction works in the Koło town hall ended with the commissioning of the rebuilt tower in 2003.

Description of the structure

The Town Hall in Koło is located in the main square of the Old Town, within an island delimited by the arms of the Warta River. It was built of brick and stone on a square-shaped plan with a high brick tower in the northern part, two wings on the north and south sides and a courtyard adjoining the main body of the building from the west, closed with a curtain wall with an entrance gate. The two-storey, partly cellared building is covered with a multi-pitched roof. The east, north, and south elevations are five-axis, while the south elevations of the wings are one-axis. In the east elevation above the main entrance to the town hall there is a four-column portico with a fronton decorated with the Koło coat of arms at the top and a balcony on the first floor. The rectangular single- and double-sashed windows of the town hall on the first floor are closed straight, on the ground floor - with segmental arch. On the outside wall of the building there is a plaque commemorating the public execution of three Poles by the Germans in the market square during World War II - on 27 April 1940 in the presence of hundreds of city residents forced to participate in the execution by the German Nazi occupation authorities.

Visitor access: The town hall is open to visitors.

Author of the note: Tomasz Łuczak, 28.12.2017

Bibliography

• Katalog zabytków sztuki w Polsce, Vol. 5, Woj. wielkopolskie, ed. Teresa Ruszczyńska, Aniela Sławska, z. 8, Pow. kolski, compiled by J. Rutkowska, Warsaw 1960, p. 17.
• Koło – ratusz, Record sheet of monuments of architecture and construction, compiled by Wojciech Ciszyński, 1997, Archive of the Voivodeship Heritage Protection Officer in Poznań - Branch in Konin.
• Wielkopolska. Słownik krajoznawczy, ed. Łęcki Włodzimierz, Poznań 2002, pp. 140-142.
• Piotr Maluśkiewicz, Województwo konińskie. Szkic monograficzny, Warszawa-Poznań 1983, pp. 186-197.
• Piotr Maluśkiewicz, Ziemia konińska. Przewodnik turystyczny, Konin 2002, pp. 96-101.
• http://kurier-kolski.pl/2010/09/kolski-wrzesien-1939 – accessed in December 2017
• http://kolo.pl/pl/217/237/zabytki – accessed in December 2017