In one of Lviv’s cafes, Dim Lehend (House of Legends), there is a room dedicated to the old Galician language (which is similar to the language spoken in the diaspora). Old words and old newspaper clippings decorate the walls.
Read More
Giovanni Zuliani (1843-1909) moved from Italy to Lviv and in 1892 founded a company specializing in mosaic and granite terrazzo prepared in Venetian style, marble ornamentation of walls and furniture, and all kinds of cement work. The company had branches in three other Galician cities: Stanisławów (Ivano-Frankivsk), Chernivtsi, and Krakow. […]
Terrazzo is a composite material made from marble, quartz, granite, glass, or other chips and poured with a binder. This material was used to pave many entranceways, stairwells, and communal spaces in Lviv’s buildings. It was often decorated with geometric designs, the year of installation, the name of the manufacturer, […]
The trend of hand-painted signs continues on this newly renovated building on Lviv’s main square. This time, in addition to the usual Ukrainian, Polish, German, English translations, there is also French, Italian, Spanish, and Chinese. (Though there is a mistake in the Italian translation—should be “teatro” and not “theatre.”) A […]
Hidden behind a tall fence at the end of a small street in Kastelivka stands a villa called “Julietka.” It was built for private use in 1891-1893 by Julian Zachariewicz and his son Alfred, two famous Lviv architects. Next to the villa is an old stable with a sundial.
“With great pleasure I immersed myself in the streets, which I had previously passed without notice; I examined the buildings, every courtyard, gazed at the windows and the flowerpots on the windowsills, as though I were trying to find at least some trace of the old Lviv, that vanished world, […]
I’ve been seeing more and more establishments use their facades to list the products that they sell or services that they provide, the old-school way. I particularly like it when the items are listed in several languages, as used to be done in Lviv before WWII. Before the languages used […]
Lviv, like most cities in the nineteenth century, needed chimney sweeps to keep chimneys clean from the soot that accumulated from burning coal. The bas-relief of a chimney sweep on Anhelovycha Street is one of the only reminders of the era of chimney sweeps. At the beginning of the twentieth […]
I found a new faux ghost sign on a shop that sells gold, silver, watches, and currency. The name of the shop is Ломбард (Lombard). The signs are in Polish and Ukrainian: Złoto (Gold) Srebro (Silver) Zegarki (Watches) Гроші (Money) Kantor (Currency exchange) This first example I’ve seen in Lviv […]
On Saturday I went on a bicycle excursion to the Pidzamche neighborhood in Lviv and found this amazing very recently uncovered ghost sign! It must have been uncovered in the last month because it wasn’t visible when I was wandering around this neighborhood in May. Judging from the sign, in […]
The building at 3 Drukarska Street was built c. 1543, and was owned by Stanislaw Schtansl Scholtz. The building later become known as “Under the Mother of God” because of a statue of the Virgin Mary on the façade. In 1858 the building housed the St. Sophia Association of the […]
