Alfred Michl's Small Palace in Bielsko-Biała

Alfred Michl's Small Palace is a villa-style tenement on the corner of ul. 3 Maja and ul. Sienkiewicza in Bielsko-Biała, at 3 Maja 13. It was built in 1895 to a design by Carl Korn for the notary Alfred Michl. The heritage register classifies the building as a palace and describes its style as eclectic with distinct Neo-Baroque features.

Form and façades

The building has one upper floor, a semi-basement and an L-shaped plan, and is covered by a mansard roof. The corner is adorned by a decorative turret with a pointed spire on a flattened dome. The elevations are asymmetrical and richly decorated: a rusticated stone plinth and a ground floor with banded rustication contrast with the upper floor of glazed brick and the white detail of the half-columns, pediments and window surrounds. The exit to the corner terrace takes the form of a porte-fenêtre.

The gate and the entrance hall

The entrance gate has rich carved decoration, and above the portal you can see the initials of the first owner: AM. At the entrance to the carriageway hall a wrought-iron grille was fitted. The hall is covered by a small dome on pendentives with polychromy featuring a motif of plant tendrils and silhouettes of swallows. In the interiors the mosaic floors, the cast-iron balustrade of the handrail and the overdoors on the upper floor, with two putti and a shell ornament, have survived.

Today

In 2021-2022 the small palace underwent a thorough renovation. It houses the seat of the Beskid Chamber of Crafts and Enterprise, and in the semi-basement there is a music club. The building stands in the very centre, near the Polish Theatre in Bielsko-Biała.

Practical information

• Address: 3 Maja 13, Bielsko-Biała.
• The building is the seat of institutions, so you usually see the interiors only during events or by arrangement; check the details before your visit.
• About three hundred metres further on is the Castle of the Sułkowski Princes.