Interesting places

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Earlier walking around Nowa Huta was like playing battleships: individual housing estates were labelled only with letters. You would leave C-2, go to B-3, and there turn to A-1. To make their space more familiar the inhabitants made up their own names for these. Today’s Teatralne housing estate was called “Taiwan” in honour of the island in the Indian Ocean, as it was far away from the centre. The Administrative Centre was called “the Palace of the Doges”, the workers’ barracks in Pleszów were called “Mexico”, the Town-hall Park – “Piccadilly”, the open-air fast food place in front of the entrance to the plant was called “Bois de Boulogne”. There were also: The Swedish House – os. Szklane Domy (Glass Houses estate), the French House – os. Centrum B and the Young Worker’s House – os. Stalowe (Steel Housing estate). It is worth mentioning that the street joining the Central Square (currently called Reagan Square) with the plant was made on the basis of the location of the Union of Lublin Mound in Lviv.

Nowa Huta’s pride lies in its socialist realist architecture. The most interesting implementations of that style can be seen in the Central Square, the Administrative Centre and in the following housing estates: Stalowe (Steel), Szkolne (School) and Teatralne (Theatre). They were developed before the “Polish October” of 1956. The remaining ones, although erected, did not receive stone facing or the appropriate details. Fashion changed and new trends in architecture were popular in facilities like: “Światowid” cinema – os. Centrum E, the first Polish large concrete slab sky-scrapers – os. Hutnicze and the so-called Swedish House – os. Szklane Domy (Steel Houses estate).

Churches here should be treated as an important architectural achievement. The fight to erect them was connected with the figures of Pope John Paul II and the priests Józef Gorzelany and Józef Kurzeja. Riots of 1960 known as the fight for “the Nowa Huta Cross” were recorded in history handbooks (today it is situated at os. Teatralne), together with the story of the erection of the “Arka Pana” church – os. Przy Arce and the church in Mistrzejowice – os. Tysiąclecia. All these played an important role in the times of martial law, being a place of patriotic demonstrations.

In Nowa Huta we can also see relics of military architecture, such as the post-Austrian fortifications: Batowice, Mistrzejowice, Krzesławice and Grębałów and the former airport in Czyżyny, now today’s Museum of Aviation and Astronautics. Many underground bunkers are situated in the housing estates and near the plant; they were developed in case of nuclear war. The many trees planted here were to weaken the force of a possible atomic blast; there were places installed on rooftops for marksmen and bases for anti-aircraft guns. The thick greenery was to make it more difficult for spies to take pictures.

Nowa Huta was a place of huge riots during martial law. Almost all of the 38 thousand workers at the plant belonged to“Solidarity”. It was here that initiated the all-Polish strikes in 1988 that made the authorities take up talks at the Round Table and in consequence change the country’s political system. The times are commemorated by the monument in Reagan Square and the ones in front of the church at os. Szklane Domy, which houses the Steelworkers’ Priesthood.