About the site
The building forms part of the so-called “špalíček” – a block of rental apartment houses occupying narrow medieval plots in the vicinity of the town hall called Hláska. Reconstruction of this block began in the early 1930s, the first stage culminating in the construction of the adjoining building. As a whole, the “špalíček” is a unique record of the remodelling of Opava’s historic centre during the First Czechoslovak Republic, and an important surviving element of Horní náměstí (Upper Square) as it existed before its wartime destruction in 1945.
Here Harald Bauer continued the architectural line established by the neighbouring corner house of Alexander Niedermeyer (Horní náměstí 381/58), designed by Otto Reichner in 1932–1933. In his design, conceived in the spirit of Neue Sachlichkeit (New Objectivity), Bauer erected a four-storey rental apartment building on the narrow, constrained plot, giving it a strikingly composed façade. Above the glazed ground-floor frontage, the elevation is flanked by semi-cylindrical columns rising to the crowning cornice. Seen from the side, these semi-columns are revealed as slightly projecting lateral walls, terminated in an expressive manner with overhanging cornices. The façade composition is further enriched with slender window sill and lintel cornices framing symmetrically arranged pairs of tripartite windows, giving the impression of a continuous horizontal band almost the full width of the frontage. The attic storey is fitted with low windows of the same width. Internally, the principal living rooms face the square, while service areas, including the staircase, overlook an internal lightwell.
The chosen solution and treatment of the façade give the building a distinctly modern appearance, despite the retention of the narrow medieval footprint. It stands as one of the most striking manifestations of New Objectivity in Opava’s historic centre and in Harald Bauer’s oeuvre.
MSt
