It boasts historical values of architectural, artistic as well as dendrological nature. The palace is considered one of the most beautiful neo-Gothic villas in Poland.

History

   As an autonomous hamlet, Piekary was first recorded in a document from 1286, in which Prince Leszek the Black allowed the Benedictines of Tyniec to set up towns and villages under German law. Piekary enjoyed this privilege after 1367 and the reign of Casimir the Great. The village belonged to the Tyniec abbey until 1785. After the First Partition of Poland, Piekary was separated from the abbey by the state border (the abbey found itself in the Austrian part of Galicia). Under the agreement of the Polish government with the Austrian government, the abbey estate on the left bank of the Vistula River became the property of the State Treasury of the Republic of Poland. As a result, the so-called Piekary estate was established covering, apart from Piekary, also the villages of: Liszki, Ściejowice, Śmierdząca (today Kryspinów), Kaszów, Nowa Wieś and Przeginia.

In 1790 some of these villages were purchased by Franciszek Żeleński, the castellan of Osiek, who chose Piekary as his seat. Soon, in place of the former Benedictine grange, he built a new, brick manor. After his death in 1801, Piekary was inherited by his son Kryspin. Around 1830 he almost doubled the size of the father’s property. He also built a large brick coach house, remodelled the 18th-century brewery and built new farm buildings. After Kryspin’s death in 1853, his son, Wit Żeleński, became the lord of Piekary. His nephew Alfred Milieski bought the village from him in 1857.

Milieski was a well-known conservative politician, member of the Galician Parliament. He descended from a Jewish family but was baptised around 1800. His parents, Walenty Milieski and Antonina née Żeleńska, owned the estate in Rychwałd near Żywiec. Soon after purchasing Piekary, he started building a new residence. The palace, completed around 1865, was soon to be recognised as one of the most beautiful neo-Gothic villas in Poland. Its designer was Filip Pokutyński (1829-1879), a professor of construction at the Krakow Technical Institute, educated in Germany and Italy, closely related to the Berlin designer community. During the construction project, Pokutyński used the walls and cellars of the previously existing building. However, this did not affect the final shape of the architectural concept. In addition to the main palace building, other farm buildings were erected at the same time (unfortunately, currently heavily damaged) and a romantic park.

The villa in Piekary is one of the few such project that have a detailed description created by the designer himself. In 1886 Pokutyński released an album entitled, Willa w Piekarach..., in which he included 14 lithographs with plans, façades and details of the décor. The introduction to the booklet read, “The choice of style and a less symmetrical form were almost a necessity to harmonise the building with the general location of the village, which balances the lofty towers of the Tyniec castle, only separated from the house by the width of the Vistula River. The layout of both mansards was also caused by the above reasons and both were equally important: one faces the rocks and the Tyniec castle, while the other faces the road and opens up a wide view of the Vistula, Bielany and Kraków; not wanting to narrow and close the view into tight window frames in front of both mansards, I used verandas to create relatively wide balconies.” Pokutyński’s book also includes measurements of neo-Gothic decorative elements (brackets, balustrades, doors, ceilings), as well as neo-Renaissance details intended for some rooms.

The residence in Piekary caused admiration right from the very beginning. In 1875 the Kłosy weekly published a woodcut by Michał Kluczewski based on Ludomir Franciszek Dymitrowicz’s drawing showing the picturesque Piekary, which an unknown author called “the adornment of the area.”

In 1901 the property in Piekary, with an area of approx. 210 ha, was taken over by Alfred’s son, Witold Milieski, the owner of the neighbouring Ściejowice. In 1934 he sold it to Włodzimierz and Helena Braun, who set up a hospital for neurotic and mentally ill patients. After the death of Włodzimierz Braun in 1937, Piekary was inherited by his sons, who parcelled out a sheer portion of the estate before WW2.

After WW2, the Brauns’ estate was nationalised and soon was finally divided. Initially, the palace housed the Herbal Technical School; then, it seated the administration of the Bolesław Bierut Coal Mine in Jaworzno; finally, it was taken over by the J. Babiński Specialist Clinic for Neurotic and Mental Patients in Kobierzyn; the clinic managed the facility until 1987. After the palace returned into private hands, the new owner began renovation. Unfortunately, the project closed with only a partial renovation of the façade (mainly north-east) and some rooms on the ground floor. Later on, it was halted.

The rest of the buildings of the complex come from the same period as the palace, i.e. the second half of the 19th century. The exception is the slightly older brewery dating back to the first half of the 19th century.

Noteworthy is also the statue of the Virgin Mary with the date 1880, positioned near the entrance gate.

Description

All structures within the complex are in a state of more or less advanced devastation. The least devastated are the outbuilding, granary and farm buildings signed in the image as G1 and G2. The brewery buildings are currently separated from the rest of the complex by a local road. Originally, it was made up of three brick and plastered buildings with barrel and sail vaults and gable roofs situated on a horseshoe plan (to the east and twin wings to the south and north) with a spacious yard enclosed by a gated wall. The east building is in a state of ruin; the south one, which is now a free-standing structure, was built on an elongated rectangular plan, with a two-bay layout; it has a two-storey section (formerly residential and utility function) and a single-storey part (utility and production function). Both sections are covered with tiles. In August 2012, the roof structure over the two-storey part of the building collapsed. The north wing covered by metal sheet is in a slightly better condition. It also has a one-storey and two-storey parts.The two-storey part (from the west) has been rebuilt many times and is inhabited. On the west side of the complex, there are farm buildings arranged in a horseshoe with an outbuilding, palace, an extension of unknown function with a collapsed roof (G3), a granary and two farm buildings belonging to the former grange. All the buildings surrounding the palace are brick-built and covered by gable, tiled roofs. The only exception is the granary which, like the palace, is covered by felt. The palace in Piekary is an irregular structure, partly one-storey, partly two-storey, with full basement, its façade facing north. The architectural dominant is an octagonal tower in the north-east corner, richly decorated, with polygonal angles supporting the protruding pinnacles topped with crenelation. The north and east façades, approached similarly by the architect, are enlivened in the centre by avant-corpses framed by slender octagonal towers; on the first floor, they have three-panel porte-fenêtre overlooking the terraces supported by arcades. Similar turrets (or overhanging turrets) are seen in the corners of the palace and determine its neat silhouette. The openings are rectangular (on the ground floor closed with a segmental arch) with typical straight dripstones bent perpendicularly downwards. The architect used pointed arches only in the windows of the tower. All facades are topped with crenelation. The body of the palace is also enlivened by terraces in the north and east elevations; they offer a magnificent view of the Vistula River and the Tyniec abbey. Currently, the park surrounding the palace is overgrown and wild that it separates the former seat of the Milieski family from the picturesque surroundings. Pokutyński attached most attention to the corner tower with thin pilasters at the corners holding up the overhanging pinnacles. The centre of the interior layout are two staircases. The main one has a rectangular plan closed with a semicircle. It can be accessed from the hall at the north elevation; the other is much more modest. It leads to the second floor to the servants’ rooms. Around these two spaces, there is a series of rooms on both floors. On the ground floor, there is a large “gentlemen’s” lounge which leads to the garden under the portico supporting the terrace of the first floor. There is an office linking in the corner to an octagonal room in the tower. It has narrow, barred windows. There are also guest rooms and a library in the south corner. The first floor was of representative character. The room from the north above the hall is the so-called “entrance room.” It has a ribbed ceiling in the form of an eight-pointed star. To the right of it, there is a study decorated with a ceiling with a Gothic truss and a decorative frieze running around; to the left, there is a “minor” room connecting with the octagonal room in the tower. In the east bay, there was a “major” room with a terrace offering a view of Tyniec; behind it, in the south section, a large dining room with a ceiling supported by girders carved in a Tudor arch. The most interesting building in terms of architecture (of course, after the palace) is the granary. It is a rectangular, brick-built and plastered, three-storey building. The ground floor and the first storey are divided by a cordon cornice; the rectangular windows are relatively low. Two storeys above the cornice and enriched with brick, neo-romantic decoration, emphasising vertical divisions in the form of lesenes and arcades in the attic section. Small square windows in a brick profiled frame from the top. The double-sloped roof, originally tiled, now covered with felt. The park on the east side of the palace is of the romantic and natural type; established around 1870, it occupies an area similar to a quadrilateral. Densely forested with pond on the viewing axis towards Tyniec and a meadow to the north; limited by a ravine with an edge lined by old oaks. The pond is enclosed from the south by a chestnut alley; on the other sides, a group of oaks. Many trees in the park are old and some monumental.

The manor house and the surrounding area are privately owned.

The area of the park surrounding the manor is fenced. The fence is mostly mesh, and it is damaged in many places. The area is unattended, and the entrance gate and wicket are often open. Accessibility to the manor house is similar. The main door is locked. The lower windows are ajar or broken.

Author of the note Grzegorz Młynarczyk, Regional Branch of the National Institute of Cultural Heritage in Kraków 01-10-2014

Bibliography

• Bogdanowski J., Katalog zabytków budownictwa przemysłowego w Polsce: powiat Kraków-województwo krakowskie. Wrocław, Wydaw. PAN, 1961
• Jaroszewski T. S., O siedzibach neogotyckich w Polsce. Warsaw 1981
• Libicki P., Dwory i pałace wiejskie w Małopolsce i na Podkarpaciu. Poznań: Dom Wydawniczy REBIS Sp. z o.o., 2012
• Piekary pod Krakowem. “Kłosy” vol. 21, 1875, no. 531
• Pokutyński F., Willa w Piekarach, Kraków 1865.