Aleje Trzech Wieszczów (Three Bards Avenue)

The history of this traffic artery extends to the mid-19th century, when a high earthen bulwark was raised here as part of the plan to turn Kraków into a fortress, to protect the western flank of the city. It was later used as the embankment for the circular train running around the city, and over time had roads delineated on both sides. The dismantling of the railway line in 1911 provided plenty of space for creative use by both city planners and architects. Elegant tenements (aleja Krasińskiego and aleja Słowackiego) were developed along the promenade, as were high-class monumental public buildings in aleja Mickiewicza, which with their panache were truly impressive.

The Silesian Seminary of Theology was built in 1926-1928; its architects – Franciszek Mączyński and Zygmunt Gawlik – were tempted by a project that is hard to pigeonhole, yet whose programme nonetheless lies with modernism. A powerful feature contained in the façade were the four monumental bas-relief sculptures by an eminent sculptor Xawery Dunikowski, which presented the four evangelists. The spacial design of the body with the sides projecting to the front, was a reference to the neighbouring building of the Industrial School by Sławomir Odrzywolski (1912).

The ordering of the greeneries along today’s Aleje Trzech Wieszczów was a separate question. It began with an action that took place on a national holiday, 11th of November in 1929, when several new saplings were planted on the plots presented by the municipality. Initially, the promenade went under the name of “Freedom Embankments”, yet it did not go down well with the people of Kraków and was abandoned. These garden-like establishments were severely reduced after the broadening of the traffic lane and cobble works along the whole artery in 1936-1938.

The work on the construction of the so-called Main Building of the National Museum, situated at the junction of al. 3-go Maja and al. Mickiewicza, began in 1934. Modified later, the design by Bolesław Schmidt, Czesław Boratyński, and Edward Kreisler, reflected the cosmopolitan tendencies prevailing in the architecture of the second half of the 1930s. The first stage of construction (from the side of the Błonia Common Green) was successfully completed by 1939. The second stage was only built between 1978-1989.

A neighbour of the National Museum is the building of the Jagiellonian Library, which was designed by Wacław Krzyżanowski, and is recognised as being the most eminent work of the monumental architecture in Kraków between the two world wars. The rhythmical vertical division of the façade, reinforced by the central projection, efficiently broke the huge size of the body. Much like in the case of the Museum, only the part from the main street, this time al. Mickiewicza, had been completed by 1939. The construction of the second part (from the side of ul. Oleandry), which was the work of Romuald Loegler, only followed from 1995 to 2001. The collection of the Jagiellonian Library contains nearly 6.5 million items, of which over 1.2 million belong to special collections: manuscripts and old prints. Some of them date back to the first years of the Jagiellonian University. Preserved in the library are among other things the manuscript of De revolutionibus orbium coelestium (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres) by Nicolas Copernicus (Mikołaj Kopernik), the 15th-century written version of the oldest Polish hymn Bogurodzica (literally: She who gave birth to God), and the 16th-century Balthasar Behem Codex (1505) being a collection of laws and rights of the City of Kraków. Written in Latin and German, it follows an ancient iconographic tradition and is richly illustrated with biblical imagery and – more importantly and interestingly – iconic scenes from the life of Kraków guilds.

The Main Building of the Academy of Mining and Metallurgy (today the AGH-UST University of Science and Technology in Kraków) was built also in al. Mickiewicza in 1921-1936. After the death of Sławomir Odrzywolski, winner of the competition for its design, the construction was completed by Wacław Krzyżanowski. The monuments of miners and steelworkers, made from ceramic material by the sculptor Jan Raszka, and which stand in front of the building, were unveiled in 1935. The same artist made the sculpture of St Barbara (the patron saint of miners, who was also chosen to be the patron saint of AGH–UST) placed on top of the roof of the Main Building. Under Nazi rule, this 7-m-high (23 feet) sculpture was taken down from its place and was not returned until 1999.