Pocztowa Kasa Oszczędności in Łódź, Bank building in Narutowicza Street, Łódź, Poland.
The Pocztowa Kasa Oszczędności is a bank building on Narutowicza Street in Łódź that combines different architectural styles in its design. Its facade features tall windows, carved stonework, and ornamental details that create visual interest across the exterior.
The plot at Dzielna Street (now Narutowicza 45) passed through several owners before Chaim Weintraub bought it in 1910 for 12,000 rubles. Bernard Landau designed the building and work began in 1911, but the shell stood unfinished when World War I broke out. In 1924 the Pocztowa Kasa Oszczędności bought it and had Józef Handzelewicz revise the design; the branch opened on 11 May 1930.
The building displays banking architecture from an era when financial institutions expressed their strength and trustworthiness through ornate facades. The heavy stonework and decorative details show how important it was for banks to appear solid and permanent to their customers.
The building stands at Narutowicza 45, with the five Atlas figures on the ground-floor front risalit facing the street, so they can be seen without entering. The passage gate in the fourth axis from the left leads to the staircase; the entrance hall was converted into a music shop in 1983, when the doorway between hall and staircase was walled up.
The five Atlas figures on the facade carry tools of trade: the leftmost holds a caduceus for commerce, the next a sheaf of hay and a sickle for farming, the central one leans on a hammer, and another has a gear wheel, an aircraft propeller and headphones for modern industry. They were carved by Zygmunt Kowalewski with Feliks Giecewicz.
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