Vul. Kravchuka, 12 – residential building ID: 2472

One of the former houses of the engineer Franciszek Goląb (architect Andrzej Goląb’s son), it was built on the newly laid vul. Kravchuka by the architect August Bogochwalski in 1906-1907. The house’s façade and interior are designed in the style of the early (ornamental) Secession. The façade, in particular, preserves Secession carpentry with small carved pillars, door wrought iron and stucco, while the staircase interior features Secession overdoors, stained glass windows, bronze details, as well as Secession paintings under a layer of plaster, which need to be cleaned and restored. The building is an architectural monument (protection number 1075-M).

Story

1900 — vul. Kravchuka (ul. Bonifratrów) is laid out.
3 February 1906 — the owner Franciszek Goląb requests permission to build a townhouse in line with the submitted drawings.
24 February 1906 — approval of the building's design drawings.
14 August 1907 — the magistrate certifies the completion of the construction.
23 August 1907 — the magistrate grants permission to use the house.
1920s-1930s — redevelopment of the second and third floors with three apartments on each floor (instead of two).

Vul. Kravchuka, vul. Sevastopolska and vul. Verkhratskoho appeared at the turn of the 20th century due to the work of architect and entrepreneur Andrzej Gołąb (Melnyk, 2011). For example, on the detailed 1892 map of Lviv by J. Chowaniec, the area behind the former military hospital appears undeveloped and planted with trees; on the 1895 map by J. Chowaniec, the laid-out ul. Hoffmanna (now vul. Patriarkha Yaremy) is already marked. Only the 1900 map shows three still unnamed parallel streets (present-day vul. Kravchuka, vul. Verkhratskoho and vul. Sevastopolska) branching off from ul. Hoffmanna. The parcellation of these streets was not yet shown.

Thus, vul. Kravchuka was laid around 1900 right behind the former military hospital, which had been added to the former Bonifratres’ monastery. Accordingly, until 1946, the street was named after the Bonifratres’ order and was built up in line with the designs of August Bogochwalski in 1900-1908. However, Andrzej Goląb, who died in 1903, was not directly involved in the design of vul. Kravchuka architecture, as stated in some sources (e.g. Melnyk, 2011). Perhaps Andrzej Goląb's role was to lay out the plots in accordance with the neighbouring streets. So, as evidenced by archival files and the monogram ‘GF’ on the cartouches of house 4, the buildings on vul. Kravchuka were commissioned and owned by the architect's son, Franciszek Goląb, an engineer.

In 1946, the street was renamed in honour of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, the founder of theoretical cosmonautics. In 1993, its name was changed in honour of the mathematician Mykhailo Kravchuk, a full member of the Taras Shevchenko Scientific Society and the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences who was repressed in 1937.

The history of house 12 on vul. Kravchuka begins on 3 February 1906, when the owner Franciszek Goląb, a senior engineer at the governor's office, requested permission to build a three-storey building (conscription number 910 4/4) on the ground parcel 6459/7. At that time, the street had no name, as Goląb describes its location as a side street from ul. Hoffmanna along the fence of the Military Hospital. F. Goląb notes that the owner of the neighbouring parcels is himself, while the parcel with conscription number 858 4/4 adjoining from the back (i.e. from vul. Verkhratskoho, ground parcel 6459/18) is owned by Ivan Verkhratsky, a gymnasium professor. Also on 3 February 1906, F. Goląb began to draw up documents for the construction of houses 8 and 10 on this street (ДАЛО, 2/3/594:1, 2; ДАЛО, 2/3/595:1, 2).

On 24 February 1906, the design drawings of the building were approved, with some changes made on 8 April 1906 (ДАЛО, 2/3/596:9). The drawings were signed by A. Bogochwalski (without the architect’s or constructor’s seal), Franciszek Goląb (the owner), and Ivan Verkhratsky (the owner of the parcel adjoining from the rear) (ДАЛО, 2/3/596:14-17). The construction of townhouse 10 had apparently begun at that time, as the boundary wall with it appears on the design drawings of house 12 as existing (ДАЛО, 2/3/596:16, 17).

On 5 August 1907, F. Goląb requested permission to use two houses at once, numbers 12 and 14 (ДАЛО, 2/3/596:9). On 12 August 1907, the water supply system was tested for pressure and permission was granted to use the water supply system for two houses at once, numbers 12 and 14 (ДАЛО, 2/3/596:11). The magistrate testified that the construction was completed on 14 August 1907, and on 23 August 1907 permission to use the building was granted (ДАЛО, 2/3/596:12). For comparison, the construction of houses 8 and 10 was completed just half a month earlier, on 27 July 1907 (ДАЛО, 2/3/594:1, 2; ДАЛО, 2/3/595:8).

In the 1920s and 1930s, two apartments on the second and third floors were redeveloped into three smaller and less comfortable ones. This fact is not confirmed in the archival file, but it can be confirmed by field research. All three entrances have identical trimming with an overdoor, but the central (new) entrance does not have Secession details that are present on all other doors in the house, such as mailboxes and small windows. Therefore, it can be argued that the redevelopment took place after the Secession period and before the Soviet period, namely in the 1920s and 1930s, when craftsmen could professionally make a portal in the style of the interior without duplicating the exquisite Secession details, probably considered unnecessary in a cheaper house.

Today the house remains fully residential. It is included in the list of architectural monuments of local significance (protection number 1075-M).

Architecture

The house was originally built as a tenement townhouse, where the apartments on all floors were rented out exclusively for residential use. It has retained its function.

The house is located in the middle of the row housing on the even-numbered side of vul. Kravchuka, whose façades show the transition from late Neo-Baroque Historicism to early Secession. It is adjacent to houses 10 and 14 and borders on the plot at vul. Verkhratskoho 11a from the rear. On the other side of vul. Kravchuka there is the large green complex of the Central Military Clinical Hospital, which was added to the military hospital after the reconstruction of the Bonifratres monastery in the 1970s.

The six-window and three-storey façade has a symmetrical layout, with a slight deviation due to the rightward shift of the entrance portal. The main axis is accentuated by side two-window avant-corpses, typical of the architecture at the turn of the 20th century, in particular of vul. Kravchuka. Initially, the architect intended the façade to be designed in the Historicist style, as presented in a single design drawing of the façade (ДАЛО, 2/3/596:14). The side avant-corpses were to be crowned with semicircular attics, the windows were to have triangular pediments. The architect designed (but did not implement) a façade in the identical Neo-Renaissance style for the neighbouring house 10 (ДАЛО, 2/3/595:11). Obviously, during the construction process, the architect's tastes changed and the decor of the ornamental (early) Secession was mechanically imposed on the metrical Historicist layout. The elements of this Secession decor and their arrangement are consistent with the decor of the house at vul. Kravchuka 4. Thus, houses 4-12 on vul. Kravchuka represent a kind of ensemble, where the side houses 4 and 12 are designed in a similar early Secession style, while the central houses 8 and 10 are in the Neo-Baroque style with some Secession elements.

People

August Bogochwalski (1864–1909) — Lviv architect who designed a number of buildings in Lviv in the late historicist and Secession styles, including residential buildings at 4–14 Kravchuk Street.
Andrzej Gołąb (1837–1903) — Lviv architect and owner of a large construction company who was actively involved in the construction of historicist residential buildings in the Lychakiv district of Lviv between 1887 and 1903.

Sources