Centrum Kultury Żydowskiej, Kraków

Centrum Kultury Żydowskiej occupies Kraków’s restored former Bne Emuna synagogue on Meiselsa Street in Kazimierz. Open since 1993 and run by the Judaica Foundation, it preserves Jewish heritage through exhibitions, lectures, concerts, films, and cultural gatherings. The building also contains a gallery, café, and antiquarian bookshop.

At 17 Meiselsa Street, Centrum Kultury Żydowskiej operates in the restored Bne Emuna synagogue. The centre opened on the twenty-fourth of November 1993, following a major modernization of the building. Its earlier life reaches back to the eighteen-eighties, when this was built as a house of prayer; it remained a religious place until the outbreak of the Second World War.

The Judaica Foundation, which runs the centre, was founded in 1991. Its idea had already developed during the nineteen-eighties, encouraged by Kraków’s Jewish community leadership. The purpose here is both to safeguard the Jewish inheritance of Kazimierz and to make room for exchange between cultures, especially by bringing younger people into contact with Jewish history and culture.

That mission plays out through exhibitions, talks, concerts, author meetings, film screenings, conferences, and seminars. Inside, the centre also includes an art gallery, a café, and an antiquarian bookshop with Judaica, old Hebrew prints, and postcards. This former prayer house therefore remains a place for gathering—now through learning, art, and conversation.