8 Kolobrzeska, Bydgoszcz, Poland
It is impossible to describe all Łódź attractions in one short article. This is why, below you will find the most important points by ITS Poland.
Freedom Square and Piotrkowska Street are the key elements of Łódź strolls. Freedom Square is an octagonal square which makes it an evenement in world scale. Here starts Piotrkowska Street which hosts many beautiful tenement houses, shops, restaurants and cafes and is probably one of the best well known promenades in Poland. It is worth to mention here Pasaż Róży (English Rose Passage), located in the gate of the tenement house at 3 Piotrkowska. It is an artistic project by artist Joanna Rajkowska to commemorate her daughter struggling with an eye disease. At Piotrkowska Street there is also the White Factory Museum and the Open Air Museum of Wooden Architecture.
Another a must see point is Manufaktura, which together with the adjacent beautiful Poznański Palace, is the factory complex of Izrael Poznański, the great factory owner in Łódź. For years it has been destroyed and forgotten. The Poznański Palace itself is called the "Łódź Louvre". Built in many styles, today it serves, among others, the function of the Museum of the History of the City of Łódź and is an evenement on a global scale. Today Manufaktura is a place where there are museums, a cinema, numerous restaurants, a hotel, climbing walls, fitness, an ice rink in winter and a beach in summer.
Księży Młyn is the factory and residential complex of Karol Scheibler. It is a city within a city. There used to be factories, houses for their workers, a kindergarten, a school, a hospital ... even its own currency was in circulation. The complex, neglected for years, has been lately regaining its glamour. Renovated factories and other buildings attract investors, residents and of course tourists. Here tourists can visit the Herbst Palace (Museum of Interiors), the oldest park in Łódź - Źródliska, the Palm House and the Museum of Cinematography.
OFF Piotrowska combines history and modernity in an interesting way. It is the site of the former Ramisch factory, which was established at the end of the 19th century. At the time of its peak development, it employed over 1,000 people. OFF Piotrkowska is currently a cluster of gastronomic establishments, service outlets and the so-called creative industries having somehow hipster character.
Radegast Station is a very important point on the map of Łódź, closely related to the history of the Łódź ghetto. It was a place from which thousands of people were packed to trains and taken to death camps including for example Auschwitz-Birkenau, the biggest Nazi German Concentration Camp. Today, there is a monument and a small museum there. Near the Radegast Station, there is another place related to the horror of the Łódź ghetto. It is the Survivors' Park and Mark Edelman Center for Dialogue. The park was established quite recently (in 2004) to commemorate people locked in the Łódź Ghetto. On the opening day, the survivors planted their trees here, there are 450 of them in total. There is also the Memorial Mound and the Monument to Poles Saving Jews with plaques commemorating the "Righteous Among the Nations". The most important river in Łódź, the Łódka River (Englih: the Boat river), runs through the entire area. In this district there is also the most famous film, television and theatre university in Poland.
One of the important architectural structures in Łódź city center is the complex of buildings of the former Łódź Power Plant, which currently houses a cultural institution under the name "EC1 Łódź - City of Culture". The revitalized and expanded EC1 complex performs cultural, artistic and educational functions. At the same time, it is an important element of the New Center of Łódź, combining architectural trends from the beginning of the last century and the modern post-industrial trend. In principle, EC1 is a space open to artists of various fields and adapted to individual creativity, workshops and group events, with the infrastructure required for this purpose. EC1 offers events that allow spending free time wisely and inspiringly. The EC1 Łódź Planetarium is located right next to the recently renovated Łódź Fabryczna Railway Station, in the New Center of Łódź. It is the most modern planetarium in Poland with a dome with a diameter of 18 m and a spherical screen with a diameter of 14 meters. In the western part of the EC1 complex, tourists can find the largest Science and Technology Center in Poland with a spherical 3D cinema. Thanks to the preservation of some of the old installations and devices and combining them with modern forms of presentation, in EC1 tourists gain a unique opportunity to acquire knowledge, among others on energy conversion.
Łódź will soon have also two new interesting attractions: Mandoria Renaisance theme park and Orientarium part of Łódź zoo devoted to Asian animals (similar to Wrocław Africarium successful idea).
Summing up, Łódź definitely doesn’t deserve its opinion of grey, industrial and quite uninteresting city. It has multitude of thought-provoking and very original attractions thanks to recent renovation works and restoring the deep-rooted glamour of the old factories and adding them modern interesting twist. Łódź redefined its own history and forged a new tourist friendly one from it. It is a city definitely worth a visit. If you would like to see it on your own, ITS Poland travel agents always remain at your disposal.
Author: Agnieszka Szwedzińska
Date: 24.11.2020
