Space

SURVIVAL 16
ART REVIEW
“CAPITAL”

22–26.06.2018
THE WALLENBERG–PACHALY PALACE
ADDRESS: ul. Karola Szajnochy, 50-529 Wrocław

 

Located in the vicinity of the Market Square, this impressive classicist residence was built in the years 1785-1787 for the Wallenberg-Pachaly family, well-known merchants and bankers. It was designed by the famous Carl Gotthard Langhans, who was considered the most successful architect working in Silesia in the second half of the 18thcentury. The palace was one of Wrocław’s first complexes built in the classicist style. The facade of the palace, with rusticated stone on the ground floor and smooth elevations of the upper storeys, divided by cordon cornice, is a prime example of this style. A characteristic element of the palace is its four-column Ionic portico. The back bay of the piano nobile contains the most presentable interior of the palace – an oval drawing room with alcoves flanked by Ionic columns. The lower ground floor used to contain banking and service rooms; a sizeable carriage house was also situated on this level. Langhans’s design included a stairwell with winding stairs and oval balustrades serving the function of a spectacular connector between the floors. In 1810, a three-axis extension designed by Carl Ferdinand Langhans was added on the western side, decorated with Ionic pilasters on the facade. It contained banking rooms, including a large column hall with a separate entrance on the ground floor. In 1890 Hermann Wolfram designed the neo-baroque south wing with a stable on the lower ground floor (which is the only surviving space of this kind in Wrocław today), thus enclosing the internal courtyard of the palace. From 1884 to 1922, the palace housed the consulate of the Kingdom of Sweden. After 1920, the Wallenberg-Pachaly family bank was taken over by Commerz und Privat Bank, but the building itself was owned by the family until 1945. A few weeks after the end of war activities, the palace was handed over to the University of Wrocław; later, it was used as the University Library. For almost 200 years of its existence, the residence has remained practically unchanged, with many original interior decor elements still surviving. The form of the edifice ranks it among the most outstanding achievements of 18th-century architecture in Wrocław. Since 2019, it has been owned by Geo Mieszkanie and Dom sp. z o.o.