Pruszkow (Pruszków) is a sizable town by the Utata river, on the west side of Warsaw. It is one of the most significant industrial centers in Mazovia as well as a very important sports and recreation center. Post-war Pruszkow lost its former value and became Warsaw’s “bedroom” alone.

Nowadays, the town begins to regain its former importance. Its perfect location, low land, and estate prices urge investors to build their plants here. Thus, Pruszkow is often visited by crowds of Polish and foreign businessmen.

Plan your trip to Pruszkow Poland with this complete Pruszkow travel guide!

 

The first records about Pruszkow come from the 16th century. But only in the 19th century, when Warsaw-Vienna Railway arrived here, the town began to develop. During the First World War, in October 1914, there was a battle of Pruszkow. Battles ended with the great victory of the Russian army, who managed to push Germans to the Plock – Bzura – Rawka front line. That front line survived until 1915. Pruszkow obtained the town rights in 1916, and in 1944 Germans located their transit camps here.

Second World War

The Second World War killed millions of people. Nazis murdered almost the whole Jew population of Pruszkow (about 1500 Jews) and about a hundred soldiers of the Home Army. On January 17, 1945, the Red Army liberated the town from German occupation.

Two months later, on March 26, NKVD arrested 16 agents of the Polish Underground State. They went on transport to Moscow, where a famous political case took place. After World War II Pruszkow became one of the largest Mazovian industrial centers. These days we find here: shaping machine factories, pencil factories, and rolling stock repair factories among others.

Pruszkow is not a typical tourist resort. It is more often associated with industry and many production plants like Herbapol or L’Oréal than with tourism itself. Pruszkow is also an important sports and recreation center. We may find here a sports hall Znicz, a stadium, and the Olympic Cycling Track BGŻ Arena, which held the European Championship 2008 and World Championship 2009. Moreover, there are two first division sport clubs, Local Sport Club Znicz (football) and Znicz Basket (men’s basketball).

Some monuments

Pruszkow can’t boast of many monuments, yet there are some worthy a visit places here. We especially recommend for you to see: the 19th century old manor with landscaped gardens, a Neo-Renaissance Sokol Palace from 1867, and an earthenware products factory from the second half of the 19th century. Worthy a visit is also the Museum of Ancient Mazovian Steel Works. Nearby Proszkow lays Karolin, a village of Mazowsze folk group (Zespół Pieśni i Tańca “Mazowsze”).

A railway station in a manor style, erected to the design of architects working for the architectural section of the Road Department of the Warsaw Directorate, supervised by Bronisław Brochowicz-Rogoyski, followed by architect Romuald Miller, is an example of a high-class utility architecture of the inter-war period. It belongs to a group of similar buildings erected in place of railway facilities destroyed during World War I. The feature is distinctive for its functionality.

History of the station

The currently functioning railway station in Pruszków was one of the similar features erected in the years 1918-1924 as part of the plan for renovating the railway infrastructure after damages of World War I. A small railway station in this town emerged in the years 1845-1846 on the northern side of the tracks of the first railway line on the territory of the Kingdom of Poland, the so-called Warsaw-Vienna Railway, under construction at that time. A larger, brick station appeared in 1888 on the southern side of the tracks. It was destroyed in 1914 as a result of acts of war.

The current building, completed around 1924, used foundations or walls of the previous structure, as in many similar cases. Auxiliary buildings such as a water tower, forge, storage cells and warehouses were nearby. In the 1930’s the station building obtained a platform shelter over the entrance to the underpass in the north. The station survived World War II, but the water tower and auxiliary buildings suffered partial damage. The surviving buildings were renovated after 1945. The station building has survived to our times only with slight alterations to the interior. Initially, the plaster of station facades was yellow-ochre.

Description

The railway station is in the center of town at the Warsaw – Łódź railway line. A representational station building is on the southern part of the tracks. To the west, there are remnants of the former auxiliary buildings. A five-story water tower is on the other side of the tracks. We don’t know the exact construction date of these buildings. The brick station building has a symmetric plan of an elongated rectangle with side avant-corps in the north facade. A gable, mansard roof, the so-called Polish roof, clad with roof tiles and housing a usable attic crowns a one-story middle part. It’s illuminated by eyelid windows in the south and dormers in the north. Two-story side parts of avant-corps flank a lower part of avant-corps, also including an attic under a four-sloped roof.

The lavish decoration of the building consists of Historicist elements juxtaposed innovatively. The stylistic of railway stations built at that time represented “a visible sign of Polish spirit.” Lower parts of walls were clad with a stone cover and pronounced buttresses highlighted corners. Rectangular window and door openings in the parterre were in arcaded panels. Profiled cornices part stories, whereas windows of the second story and decorative surrounds stress the attic.

Two-part gables over side parts of the building with volutes, decorated with cornices, ornamental plinths and spheres are most distinctive. The building represents a pass-through railway station type. Stairs precede the main entrance which is along the axis of the southern facade. Inside the building, there’s a central hall with a waiting room, ticket offices and former office rooms on the ground floor. An original wooden beamed ceiling draws attention here, which is almost the same as the one applied in the station in Modlin in the same period.