Mr and Ms Friml’s Tenement House

In 1938, the construction of a corner apartment building at 909 Mánesova Street was completed. The construction of the tenement house took place between 28 October 1938 and 26 July 1939. The house was designed by the designer and builder František Komárek, who came from the family of a peasant who owned a brickworks and a sauerkraut factory. His father Josef was the mayor of Svobodné Dvory between 1903 and 1906. František Komárek received his building concession in 1926 and in 1949, his company was nationalized and administered by Československý stavební podnik (Czechoslovak Construction Company).

 

In the surviving plans, the apartment house was designed a three-story building with a basement and a courtyard. The house was 17.27m long to Mánesova Street and 15.25m to the park between the tenement houses. 

 

In the basement there was a common drying and laundry room, private storage cubicles, a garage, a coal store, a boiler room and the caretaker’s apartment with a kitchen, a hall, one room, a pantry, a bathroom, and a toilet. 

 

The ground floor consisted of three residential units. The smaller apartment contained a hall, a kitchen, a pantry, a bathroom, a toilet, two rooms, a balcony, and a maid’s room. The larger apartment had one more room and an open terrace. The third apartment was two rooms larger but did not have a balcony. On the first floor there was a large apartment with an area of 167.38m2. This apartment consisted of an indoor garden, a balcony, five rooms, a kitchen, a hall, a maid’s room, a pantry, and a larder. 

 

The second floor of the house contained two apartments. The smaller apartment contained two rooms, a balcony, a hall, a pantry, a bathroom, a pantry, a toilet, a kitchen, and a maid’s room. The larger apartment had one more room. The third floor had the same layout as the second floor. 

The house façade was designed in a purist manner and enclosed by a louvred cornice marking the crown cornice, and there was a slight lesene pattern around the windows. At the very top of the façade facing Mánesova Street was a flagpole. 

 

The building was constructed as a brick-lined reinforced concrete frame. The house had a staircase that was anchored into the walls and into the reinforced concrete parts of the house. It was equipped with a sewerage system, which led to the municipal sewer. The house was in use from 1 July 1939.

 

JFB