Name: Interior design at the Palace of Maurycy Poznański - the seat of the Art Museum in Łódź
Client: Museum of Art in Łódź
Location: Łódź, ul. Gdańska 34
Area: 1 192 m2
Design Team: Maciej Taczalski, Karolina Taczalska
Photography: 4Wymiar Rafał Tomczyk
The palace at 38 Więckowskiego Street was erected by Israel Poznański for his son Maurycy and his wife and Sara Salomea née Silberstein. Its construction concluded in 1902. The palace, designed by Adolf Zeligson in neo-renaissance style was most likely based on the edifice of St. Marks Library in Venice by Jacopo Sansovin.
The Museum of Modern Art was opened in 1948. Probably while adapting the palace to the new function, part of the lavish interior design was removed (especially within the 2nd floor, where there only two surviving ceiling mouldings, found in the rooms facing Więckowskiego Street) and some were covered by adding screen walls. As a witness of the former glitz, only the grand corner room with a coffered, mazed ceiling, oak panelling with upholstery and parquet mosaic, now known as the Lecture Hall, remained.
With the joint effort of our studio, the Provincial Conservator of Monuments and the Museum of Art, the screen walls were removed in the next salon, called the Mirror Room due to its decor. After the front walls were dismantled, a richly decorated ceiling and wall stucco with gilding emerged, door woodwork with gilding and panelling with gilding, mirrors and upholstery. After completing the documentation and carrying out complex conservation procedures, it was possible to restore the room to its former glory.
Another thing of major importance was preserving the interior of the Neoplastic Room, designed especially to suit the museum’s needs by Władysław Strzemieński in 1948. Based on the excavations made, it was possible to determine the original colours of these rooms and recreate their original appearance of as faithfully as possible.
The remaining rooms were adapted to fit their museal function and equipped with installations necessary for the appropriate display of works of modern art.