Szara Kamienica, Kraków

Szara Kamienica is the historic townhouse at Main Market Square 6, at the corner with Sienna Street. Its fabric began to take shape in the thirteenth century. The generous entrance hall still has a fifteenth-century ceiling, while two ground-floor chambers retain medieval rib vaults.

By the turn of the fifteenth century, this house had been joined to its neighbour, creating an exceptionally large residence; its second, palace-like storey followed during that century. The building became a Baroque palace in the early seventeenth century. A major eighteenth-century renewal restored its grand character after decline, and the exterior has changed little since that work was completed in the early seventeen-sixties.

Notice the two memorial plaques set into the façade. One identifies this address as Tadeusz Kościuszko’s headquarters during the uprising of 1794; the other marks the National Government’s quarters during the Kraków uprising of 1846. In 1853, owner Stanisław Feintuch adopted the surname Szarski from this house and opened a shop here.

Its stock once ranged from coffee and bread to bricks and varnish, before it developed into the well-known Szarski i Syn colonial-goods business. The ground-floor shop interior and its painted vault were created by Józef Mehoffer during the restoration of 1907 to 1913.