Sanatorium Complex in Ustroń-Zawodzie

Zawodzie is a spa district of Ustroń on the slope of Równica, designed from scratch in the spirit of modernism. It is made up of buildings for tourism, treatment and rehabilitation: the large mass of the Równica sanatorium and the conical holiday houses scattered across the hillside, known as the pyramids. In 2023 the complex was entered in the heritage register.

A plan for seven thousand patients

The idea of a modern spa complex in Ustroń began to take shape at the turn of the 1950s and 1960s. The design was entrusted to architects of the General Construction Design Office, Henryk Buszko and Aleksander Franta, and Tadeusz Szewczyk also took part in the work. On an area of 200 hectares on the slope of Równica, facilities for 7,000 people were planned: a sanatorium, a rehabilitation hospital, a spa house and 26 holiday houses.

In the design the architects included 28 holiday buildings, freely arranged on the slope. They have about eight storeys and at least 200 beds, a reinforced concrete structure and a conical shape, from which their name comes. The original plan also assumed four sanatoria of 200 beds each, which were ultimately fitted into a single mass, the Równica sanatorium.

Architecture

The dominant feature of the complex is the Równica sanatorium: a building on pillars stretched across the slope, from 5 to 12 storeys high. The mass is distinguished by alternating dark bands of windows and balconies and a light, smooth façade. The building was erected from prefabricated elements on a reinforced concrete frame. According to the authors of the scheme, the form was meant to correspond with the mountain landscape and reflect the climatic character of the region.

The design by Franta, Buszko and Szewczyk was included in the atlas "20th-Century World Architecture: The Phaidon Atlas".

The pyramids and their names

In the Polish People's Republic era the pyramids were holiday centres and sanatoria of workplaces, which acted as investors. The houses have names of plants and animals, for example Narcyz, Wilga, Jaskółka, Rosomak, Magnolia, Muflon or Orlik, and their former hosts included mines from Jastrzębie-Zdrój and Ruda Śląska, steelworks, a shipyard from Gdynia and works from Dębica. After privatisation some of the pyramids passed to individual owners, and the Równica sanatorium with its medical facilities became part of the spa.

Nearby

Right next to it, about 300 metres away, is the pump room in Zawodzie.

Less than a kilometre from the complex lies the Forest Park of Surprises, and not much further the Jan Jarocki Ustroń Museum.

Higher up the slope of Równica is the Równica Mountain Park.

Practical information

• Place: Zawodzie, a district of Ustroń on the slope of Równica, Cieszyn County.
• The buildings serve sanatorium and holiday functions, so the interiors are usually entered by guests and patients; the best way to see them from the outside is on a walk around the district.