Hydropolis began as a reservoir capable of holding 12 million litres of clean water, not as a museum. In 1905, a former sand-and-gravel filter became Breslau’s principal water reserve, sending treated water onward to the pressure tower. Beneath the meadow-covered roof is a nineteenth-century neo-Gothic underground structure covering 4,600 square metres.
Its four vaulted chambers, brick walls and deep earth covering explain why this building once disappeared so completely into the landscape. The reservoir kept serving the city until 2011. It survived wartime damage in 1945, when bombs and shells punctured its roof, and it was inundated during Wrocław’s devastating 1997 flood.
After a four-year conversion, Hydropolis opened here in December 2015 as Poland’s only centre of its kind devoted to water. Inside, modern displays explore water through seven themed areas. You can enter a life-size replica of the bathyscaphe Trieste, the first vessel to reach Earth’s deepest point, and encounter a 46.5-metre water printer, a 3.5-metre water vortex and a 360-degree film screen.
The centre is accessible for visitors with disabilities. It opens Monday to Friday from 9:00 to 18:00, and at weekends from 10:00 to 20:00.
