Municipal Apartment Building in Prague Suburbs

On 23 June 1923, the authority announced a competition for the construction of a two-story municipal house for Prague Suburbs, with a deadline of 1 September 1923. Bids were received from the builders Josef Novotný, František Kándl and Jan Kříž, František Polesný, Josef Mudra, Václav Rejchl Jr. and the Hypius, Pluhovský, Sedlák company. Josef Mudra designed the building with a budget of CZK 469,264. At its meeting, a committee consisting

of Mayor Josef Kotek, Deputy Mayor František Cihla and two councilors decided that the project would be entrusted to Josef Mudra, whose bid was the lowest, although only CZK 760 lower than that of Václav Rejchl Jr.

  

The program of the building was set out in the competition conditions: “Basement cellars

in the underground, two apartments on the ground floor, the first one with a kitchen and one room, the second one with a kitchen and three rooms, both with proper facilities. The first

and second floors are identically divided and also contain two apartments, each with separate facilities and containing a kitchen and three rooms. On the third floor, there are two apartments, each with a kitchen and one room. [...] The house will be provided with sewerage, water supply and electric lighting. [...] The façade will be of reform plaster, colored and

in contemporary taste.” The ground-floor and the two attic one-room apartments did not have bathrooms, but all the three-room apartments did; they also had maids’ rooms next to

the kitchens. In the basement, there were eight cellars, a pump room, and a laundry with

a drying room and a toilet. 

 

Josef Mudra conceived the façade to the street in a generous way. It was divided by ten window axes; the two outermost ones were large three-part windows, the eight middle ones were narrow two-part windows. The ground floor and the first floor were divided by a pair

of profiled cornices, while the first and second floors had each a profiled cornice across

the width of the eight middle windows. The windowsills of the eight middle windows on the first floor were filled with eight decorative fields with a strip ornament, and the windowsills of

the eight middle windows on the second floor had circular ornaments. The eight middle windows on the ground, first and second floors were separated by double lesene frames.

The roof frame was originally broken by four arched roof windows, which were later replaced by larger rectangular dormers. The intricate decoration of the façade, which consisted

of cornices, lesenes and decorative friezes, was emphasized by contrasting colors. 

 

The courtyard probably housed several municipal institutions, such as the fire department,

he municipal library and the municipal cloakroom, as Josef Mudra refers to the project as “

a municipal house with offices, a firehouse, and a municipal library.” The building no. 486 was briefly the seat of the municipality between 1924 and 1926, although the house itself contained only apartments. However, these temporary premises were apparently soon no longer sufficient, as a new town hall was built in the immediate vicinity.

 

LZL