Kopernika street is located in central Bydgoszcz. Several buildings on Kopernika Street are registered on the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship Heritage List. The street is named for

Nicolaus Copernicus Nicolaus Copernicus (; pl, Mikołaj Kopernik; gml, Niklas Koppernigk, german: Nikolaus Kopernikus; 19 February 1473 – 24 May 1543) was a Renaissance polymath, active as a mathematician, astronomer, and Catholic Church, Catholic cano ...

(1473 1543).

Location

Kopernika Street is located in the eastern part of central Bydgoszcz. The street runs between

Ossoliński Alley The House of Ossoliński (plural: Ossolińscy) is the name of a Poland, Polish szlachta (nobility) family. Because Polish adjectives have different forms for the genders, Ossolińska is the form for a female family member. History The Ossoliński ...

and Staszica and Paderewskiego Streets. It is close to the precinct of the

Pomeranian Philharmonic , native_name_lang = , image = File:Bdg Filharmonia fr 1 07-2013.jpg , image_size = 300px , image_alt = Pomeranian Philharmonic Bydgoszcz , image_caption = Pomeranian Philharmonic in Bydgoszcz , coor ...

orchestra.

Naming

The name of the street has changed over time: * Eigenheimm Straße A and then Hindenburg straße (1914 1920); * Ulica Kopernika (1920 1939); * Bismarck Straße (1939 1945) after

Otto von Bismarck Otto, Prince of Bismarck, Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen, Duke of Lauenburg (, ; 1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898), born Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck, was a conservative German statesman and diplomat. From his origins in the upper class of J ...

; * Ulica Kopernika (1945 onwards).

History

In the early 20th century, Bydgoszcz was called "Bromberg". A large distinct area developed east of the town centre. This area was delineated by

Adam Mickiewicz Alley Adam Mickiewicz Alley is one of the main streets of downtown district in Bydgoszcz, where several buildings are registered on the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship Heritage List. Location The street links Gdańska Street to Józef Weyssenhoff ...

and Markwarta, Paderewskiego and Staszica streets. The area lay north of a Christian cemetery which became Ludowy Park, on Jagiellońska street. In 1906, the Emperor Wilhelm Royal Institute of Agriculture, (''Kaiser Wilhelm's Institut für Landwirtschaft zu Bromberg'') was constructed to the east of the area. At the same time, between 1905 and 1907, the Royal School of Bromberg (''Stadt Real Schule'') was constructed to the west of the area. This became the Copernicanum building. Between 1903 and 1907, most of the tenements on

were completed. This formed the north boundary of the area. Between 1910 and 1912, the People's School for Boys (''Bürgerschule'') was formed on the western boundary. It became High School Nr.6. The resulting triangular area was then further developed as the ''Sielanka'' ( en, Idyll). In December 1912,

Josef Stübben Hermann Josef Stübben (10 February 1845 in Hülchrath – 8 December 1936 in Frankfurt am Main) was a German architect and urban planner, one of the best-known theorists and practitioners in Germany at the end of the 19th century. Stübben stu ...

(1845 1936) made a sketch for the area. The project was led by Heinrich Metzger, and urban engineer. The surveyor was Bernhard Hirsch. In the draft, the area was divided into seven irregularly shaped parts. Five of the parts were devoted to the construction of small houses. These parts were near what became Asnyka Street and the southern part of Paderewskiego Street. The Copernicanum building was built on Staszica Street but the south western tip of the area near Markwarta street remained available for development. At the time, this land was the property of the

Province of Posen The Province of Posen (german: Provinz Posen, pl, Prowincja Poznańska) was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1848 to 1920. Posen was established in 1848 following the Greater Poland Uprising as a successor to the Grand Duchy of Posen, w ...

. It later became a square named after Leszek the White (1124 1227), a Polish prince. In the 1920s, fifty plots for building were defined. Their land areas varied from 600 to 1400 m². The first house to be built in Sielanka became 5 Kopernika Street. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, construction ceased. In 1925, the town allowed the resumption of construction and encouraged the project with generous loans and appropriate regulations. Local workers were employed. Between 1914 and 1945, the town issued forty-eight building permits. Thirty-six of these were issued between 1927 and 1933.

Places and buildings

Copernicanum building

The Copernicum building appears on the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship Heritage List, Nr.601363, Reg.A/784 (5 May 1992)Załącznik do uchwały Nr XXXIV/601/13 Sejmiku Województwa Kujawsko-Pomorskiego z dnia 20 maja 2013 r. It was constructed between 1903 and 1906 by Carl Zaar and Rudolf Vahl. The building is designed in the

Art Nouveau Art Nouveau (; ) is an international style of art, architecture, and applied art, especially the decorative arts. The style is known by different names in different languages: in German, in Italian, in Catalan, and also known as the Modern ...

(

Secession Secession is the withdrawal of a group from a larger entity, especially a political entity, but also from any organization, union or military alliance. Some of the most famous and significant secessions have been: the former Soviet republics le ...

) style. The Copernicum building has had several occupants and owners. These include a

Prussia Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an em ...

n '' realschule''; a Copernicus High School for mathematics and natural sciences (1923); and a military hospital during the

German occupation German-occupied Europe refers to the sovereign countries of Europe which were wholly or partly occupied and civil-occupied (including puppet governments) by the military forces and the government of Nazi Germany at various times between 1939 an ...

(1939 1945). Since 2005, the owner has been the '' Kazimierz Wielki University'' (after Casimir III the Great (1330 1370)). File:Bdg Copernicanum nar 1 07-2013.jpg, Copernicus building from Kopernika street File:Copernicanum panorama.jpg, Copernicus building back yard File:Bdg Copernicanum szcz 5 07-2013.jpg, Copernicus building main entrance File:Bdg Copernicanum noc 5 07-2013.jpg, Copernicus building by night

Kopernika Square

Kopernika Square is a green area landscaped in 1973. Its

statuary A statue is a free-standing sculpture in which the realistic, full-length figures of persons or animals are carved or cast in a durable material such as wood, metal or stone. Typical statues are life-sized or close to life-size; a sculpture t ...

includes a metal sculpture of a female figure by Maria Chudoba-Wiśniewska, a mid-20th century sculptor of

Poznań Poznań () is a city on the River Warta in west-central Poland, within the Greater Poland region. The city is an important cultural and business centre, and one of Poland's most populous regions with many regional customs such as Saint John ...

. The sculpture weighs 864 kg and is 4,57m tall. The sculpture was erected during the National Open Air Sculpture Festival (''Ogólnopolski Plener Rzeźbiarski'') which took place from August to September 1973. Round shaped stones can be found on the grass, positioned on ellipse rings surrounding the statue: they represent the

planet A planet is a large, rounded astronomical body that is neither a star nor its remnant. The best available theory of planet formation is the nebular hypothesis, which posits that an interstellar cloud collapses out of a nebula to create a you ...

s of the

Solar System The Solar SystemCapitalization of the name varies. The International Astronomical Union, the authoritative body regarding astronomical nomenclature, specifies capitalizing the names of all individual astronomical objects but uses mixed "Solar S ...

in orbit, including the Sun and the Moon. File:Skwer Mikolaja Kopernika.jpg, Statue in Kopernika Square File:Kopernika street west.jpg, Ellipse rings with round stones on Kopernika Square File:Copernic square ellipses 2.jpg, Kopernika Square in summer

House at 1 Asnyka street, corner with Kopernika street

In 1932, the house on the corner of Asnyka Street and Kopernika Street was designed, built and occupied by the architect Bogdan Raczkowski (1888 1939) in 1932. It is designed in the Functionalist style. In 1921, Rackowski became a member of the Bydgoszcz municipal council. In December 1922, he became a member of the City Development Committee. In 1934, Raczkowski retired. His wife Maria, his daughter Danuta and he were arrested and shot on 4 October 1939 in the forest north of Bydgoszcz ( pl, Las Gdański). His brother Tadeusz was murdered later the same month in the Valley of Death. File:Bdg Asnyka1 2.jpg, 1 Asnyka Street, Kopernika building to the left File:Asnyka 1 corner.jpg, 1 Asnyka Street, facade File:Bdg Sielanka 4 07-2013.jpg, Elevation from Kopernika Street

House at 3 Kopernika street

3 Kopernika Street on the corner with Asnyka Street was constructed between 1933 and 1935. It was designed by Paweł Wawrzon in the Functionalist style. The large villa has a massive

avant-corps An ''avant-corps'' ( it, avancorpo or , plural , german: Risalit, pl, ryzalit), a French term literally meaning "fore-body", is a part of a building, such as a porch or pavilion, that juts out from the ''corps de logis'', often taller than othe ...

which carries a

balcony A balcony (from it, balcone, "scaffold") is a platform projecting from the wall of a building, supported by columns or console brackets, and enclosed with a balustrade, usually above the ground floor. Types The traditional Maltese balcony is ...

. On both street elevations there are ample shed

dormer A dormer is a roofed structure, often containing a window, that projects vertically beyond the plane of a pitched roof. A dormer window (also called ''dormer'') is a form of roof window. Dormers are commonly used to increase the usable space ...

s overhanging the

gable A gable is the generally triangular portion of a wall between the edges of intersecting roof pitches. The shape of the gable and how it is detailed depends on the structural system used, which reflects climate, material availability, and aesth ...

. The entrance has a delicate

transom Transom may refer to: * Transom (architecture), a bar of wood or stone across the top of a door or window, or the window above such a bar * Transom (nautical), that part of the stern of a vessel where the two sides of its hull meet * Operation Tran ...

light, topped by an

oeil-de-boeuf An ''oeil-de-boeuf'' (; en, "bull's eye"), also ''œil de bœuf'' and sometimes anglicized as ''ox-eye window'', is a relatively small elliptical or circular window, typically for an upper storey, and sometimes set in a roof slope as a do ...

and a springline window. File:Bdg Sielanka 3 10-2013.jpg, 3 Kopernika Street File:Kopernika 3 (2).jpg, 3 Kopernika Street, façade File:Kopernika 3 portal.jpg, 3 Kopernika Street, entrance

Building at 5 7 Kopernika street

The large house at 5 7 Kopernika Street was built between 1914 and 1916 by Rudolf Kern. It was designed in the early modernist style. The house was built for the Secretary of the

Bydgoszcz Bydgoszcz ( , , ; german: Bromberg) is a city in northern Poland, straddling the meeting of the River Vistula with its left-bank tributary, the Brda. With a city population of 339,053 as of December 2021 and an urban agglomeration with more ...

Regency, Ernest Werner. Later, another floor was added. The house had a family area on the ground floor with five bedrooms above and servants' quarters in the basement. The house has two

. One is on the main elevation topped by a

. The other one is on the side. It is curved with thin and tall openings. At the gable, a large

is situated between two kernel and eyelid dormers. The entrance has a semi-circular transom light, and two

pilaster In classical architecture Classical architecture usually denotes architecture which is more or less consciously derived from the principles of Greek and Roman architecture of classical antiquity, or sometimes even more specifically, from the ...

s, one on either side. File:Kopernika 5.jpg, 5 Kopernika Street File:Kopernika 5 facade.jpg, 5 Kopernika Street, façade and entrance

House at 7a Kopernika street

The villa at 7a was built between 1933 and 1935. It was designed by Bolesław Polakiewicz. in the functionalist style. Polakiewicz designed 9 buildings Kopernika Street and

. The villa demonstrates cubic or rectangular forms, enhanced by curves and openings. File:Bdg Kopernika7a 2.jpg, 7a Kopernika Street File:Kopernika 7a.jpg, 7a Kopernika Street, facade File:Kopernika 7a 9.jpg, 7a Kopernika Street and 9 Kopernika Street at the corner with

Villa at 9 Kopernika Street

9 Kopernika Street was built between 1932 and 1933. It was another design by Bolesław Polakiewicz in the functionalist style. The villa is near the corner with Ossoliński Alley. File:Kopernika 9 2.jpg, 9 Kopernika Street File:Kopernika 9.jpg, 9 Kopernika Street from Ossoliński Alley File:Bdg Kopernika11 1.jpg, 16 Kopernika Street (left), 9 Kopernika Street (centre) and 7a Kopernika Street (right)

Villa at 10 Kopernika street

10 Kopernika Street was built on the corner of Szenwalda Street between 1930 and 1931. It was designed by Stanisław Mankowski in a Polish national style with elements of functionalism. The house became a local branch of the

Deutsche Bank Deutsche Bank AG (), sometimes referred to simply as Deutsche, is a German multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, and dual-listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and the New York Sto ...

. In 2005, the building underwent renovation. The main architectural elements of the building are the entrances on both streets, the

and the

s. File:Bdg KopernikaDB hdr1 05-2013.jpg, 10 Kopernika Street File:Bdg DeutscheBank 5-2015.jpg, 10 Kopernika Street, entrance to Szenwalda Street File:Bdg Kopernika10 01-2014.jpg, 10 Kopernika Street,

weather vane A wind vane, weather vane, or weathercock is an instrument used for showing the direction of the wind. It is typically used as an architectural ornament to the highest point of a building. The word ''vane'' comes from the Old English word , m ...

File:Bdg Sielanka sn9 12-2013.jpg, 10 Kopernika Street, entrance

House at 12 Kopernika street

12 Kopernika Street was built between 1932 and 1936. It was designed in the functionalist style by engineer A. Knauff from

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

File:Kopernika 12.jpg, 12 Kopernika Street

House at 14 Kopernika street

14 Kopernika Street was built in 1934 in the functionalist style. The house has its original vertical glass opening overhanging the entrance which allows light to enter each floor. File:Kopernika 14.jpg, 14 Kopernika Street File:Kopernika 14 st gl.jpg, 14 Kopernika Street, original vertical glass opening.

House at 16 Kopernika Street

The villa was built in 1933 in an early modernist style. It was listed on the ''Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship'' heritage list as number 601364, registration A/61/1-2, 20 January 2002.zabytek, kujawsko-pomorskie, issued=1.03.2014 The villa was commissioned by Antoni Weynerowski, the owner of a successful shoe factory, ''LEO''. The shoe factory became '' KOBRA''. The house was a wedding gift to his son, Witold and his wife Julia née Kessler. She was from the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

, the daughter of a rich merchant and so the roof was designed in the Dutch style of de l'Orme. The villa was surrounded by beautiful gardens. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, the villa became the property of the city and became a kindergarten for the children of members of the police force. File:Willa-Kopernika-16 1182.jpg, 16 Kopernika Street File:Kopernika 16 facade.jpg, 16 Kopernika Street from the garden File:Kopernika 16 facade ossol.jpg, 16 Kopernika Street, facade File:Kopernika 16 Bydg.jpg, de l'Orme

roof File:Willa przy ul. Kopernika 16, Bydgoszcz by AW.jpg, 16 Kopernika street, gable of the garage building (right)

References

External links

*
Copernicanum on Kazimierz Wielki University site web

Bibliography

* * {{Bydgoszcz streets and squares Cultural heritage monuments in Bydgoszcz Streets and squares in Bydgoszcz Villas in Bydgoszcz