WALK 3

	Length: approx. 2000 m (Part 1 – 1000 m, Part 2 – 1000 m) Time: approx. 1 hour (Part 1 – approx. 30 min., tram ride – approx. 5 min., Part 2 – cca 30 min.) The city of smokestacks and pipelines (Ostrava-Vítkovice, Ostrava-Mariánské Hory) Ruská street (blast furnace, chateau) – Mírové náměstí (town hall, parish church of St Paul, U-haus) – Tržní street (market, crèche, Štítová ‘colony’) – Lidická street (Štítová ‘colony’) – Jeremenkova street – Mírové náměstí (tram no. 3 to the ‘Mariánské náměstí’ stop) – Bendlova street (Ignát colliery ‘colony’) Factory buildings, chimneys, smokestacks, pipelines, overhead pulleys, railways and red brick industrial buildings? Pure Vítkovice. This district of Ostrava has its own unique character, and you are sure to enjoy a walk here. Vítkovice is not a district where there is a factory – it is a factory with its own little town. The tram winds through the gaps between the factory buildings, and every street here seems to end in a cat’s cradle of pipelines, a smokestack or at least a rusty fence. Right next to the blast furnace is the hospital, then the tube rolling mill, then the town hall, then a hotel, then the steelworks. Above the factory roofs tower smokestacks, gasometers and a church spire. Workers’ cottages, parks, squares and red brick terraced streets look like something out of an old English detective story. Everything here was subordinated to industry – it is a world of red bricks. From the factory-owner at his desk in his grand villa to the tired steelworkers enjoying a refreshing beer at the end of their shift. Vítkovice is an urban heritage zone and the historical blast furnaces have been entered in the nascent list of European cultural heritage sites.
	1. Vítkovice chateau (Antonín Krause 1847) This two-storey Empire-style building is surrounded by factories which encroached on the chateau gardens. Formerly known as the ‘Centralhaus’, the chateau used to be an imposing headquarters for the directors of the Vítkovice Ironworks. Although the owners of the ironworks – the Rothschild family – did not spend much time here, they used the chateau to receive important guests, including the Austrian Emperor Franz Josef and the first president of the independent Czechoslovakia, Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk.
	2. Mírové náměstí (‘Peace Square’) This is the central square of the Vítkovice district, and is surrounded on nearly all sides by factory buildings. In the middle of the square is an information panel with a map, describing all of the most important buildings in Vítkovice and showing a suitable tour route. For a taste of the down-to-earth atmosphere of Vítkovice, why not pop into one of the local pubs.
	3. Town Hall (Max von Ferstel 1902) The red brick neo-Gothic town hall is located on Vítkovice’s main square, and houses local government offices.
	4. Company hotel and gymnasium (Hans Ulrich 1887 and 1891) This building was used to accommodate foreign guests and also served as the cultural centre of the Vítkovice district. In addition to the guest rooms, the hotel had an ornate Art Nouveau-style salon and a gymnasium. There was also a restaurant, where the steel-workers would drink to celebrate each crankshaft or boiler that had been successfully dispatched to one of the world’s great shipping fleets. The building is next to the town hall and is currently under reconstruction.
	5. Church of St Paul (August Kirstein 1886) This neo-Gothic church was dedicated to St Paul in honour of the former director of the Vítkovice Ironworks, Paul Kupelwieser. The first part to be built was the church tower – which served as a water tower and an observation deck for the local fire brigade – and the three-nave church was then built around it.
	6. U-Haus (x2) On each side of the square is a large residential building for workers in the shape of the letter U. The ground floors now contain retail premises. Walk round to the other side of a U-Haus to the yard. You will see that the upper-floor apartments are accessed by outdoor staircases supported by decorative girders.
	7. Company crèche (1886) This small ground-floor building housed the Vítkovice company crèche and is not far from the church. The crèche was opened in 1857, and was probably the first of its kind in the whole of Europe.
	8. Market (Hans Ulrich 1899) The ground-floor market building formed part of a dense network of shops and services in central Vítkovice. Over 100 years ago you could buy cocoa or tropical fruit here. The directors of the Vítkovice Ironworks placed great emphasis on the welfare of their employees. The market building was surrounded by stalls. Now visitors can see an open-air gallery of enamelled crafts.
	9. Štítová ‘colony’ From the crèche, take the footpath to Lidická street. The path is lined on both sides by red brick terraced houses, forming a complex of workers’ housing known in Czech as a ‘colony’. This is not industrial England – it is typical Vítkovice. Unlike the inhabitants of the ‘Baťa houses’ in Zlín (built much later by the industrialist Tomáš Baťa for the workers in his shoe factory), the Vítkovice workers were allowed to keep chickens and grow vegetables in their small gardens. There are several such ‘colonies’ in Vítkovice. All of them are different; each has its own special character and atmosphere.
	10. Tram to Mariánské Hory From Mírové náměstí (‘Peace Square’, the main square of Vítkovice) to the neighbouring district of Mariánské Hory you can take tram no. 3. The short journey along 1. máje street offers a fascinating industrial panorama, as you pass a 90 metre-high gasometer or a factory producing train wagons. Get off the tram at the ‘Mariánské náměstí’ stop.
	11. Ignát colliery ‘colony’ This old miners’ housing complex (‘colony’) with two-storey houses was built in the early 20th century for employees at the Ignát coal mine. The houses are located in three parallel streets: Bendlova, Slévárenská and Daliborova. The ground floors house shops, restaurants and other services. In Bendlova street there are several pawnbrokers’ shops and junk shops – a paradise for lovers of antiques and old curios. Most of the houses have been restored, yet it is still easy to imagine what life must have been like here at the turn of the 20^th century.
	12. Cemetery Along one side of Železárenská street is a huge factory, on the other side is a melancholy old cemetery. An ideal place for a date – for real romantics only.
	13. The flame Walking past the old cemetery you will surely see a huge flame shooting up at intervals from a pipe somewhere in the factory on the opposite side of the road. Not for nothing was the district of Mariánské Hory originally known as Čertova Lhota, meaning roughly ‘Devil’s Village’.