Muzeum Witrażu w Krakowie, Kraków

Kraków’s Stained Glass Workshop and Museum combines a functioning stained-glass studio with exhibitions and an archive. Housed in a purpose-built townhouse from nineteen oh six and nineteen oh seven, it preserves the atmosphere of an early twentieth-century workshop and traces the city’s links to artists including Stanisław Wyspiański and Józef Mehoffer.

Behind this historic townhouse is Kraków’s Stained Glass Workshop and Museum, a place where a working studio and a museum share the same home. The workshop began in nineteen oh two as the Kraków Stained Glass Works of Stanisław Gabriel Żeleński, Poland’s first major enterprise of its kind. Żeleński had this building constructed in nineteen oh six and nineteen oh seven for the exacting work of making stained glass, with architect Ludwik Wojtyczko assisting him.

Its original interior arrangement and decoration survive, preserving the feel of an early twentieth-century workshop. The museum itself was created in two thousand four by visual artist Piotr Ostrowski, who joined making, teaching, and exhibitions under one roof. Inside, artists continue to make new panels, so the craft is not merely displayed here but practiced.

The studio worked with leading Young Poland artists, including Stanisław Wyspiański and Józef Mehoffer. Its archive holds sketches, drawings, hand-made designs, and completed works; together they form Poland’s richest collection connected with stained-glass art. In two thousand sixteen, the museum began reconstructing Wyspiański’s Apollo Bound, a stained-glass work destroyed during the Second World War.