Fryderyk Müller House

The tenement at ulica Piotrkowska 46 was built in the second half of the 1860s and changed hands many times before passing to pharmacist Fryderyk Müller, whose name it bears to this day. The building is entered in the heritage register and stands as a witness to the first decades of industrial Łódź.

The plot before the tenement

The original, wide plot under the present number 46 originally extended as far as ulica Wschodnia [Eastern Street], with a garden occupying its rear section. The successive owners were Christian Linke from 1825, then his widow Anna Justyna Linke, followed by Jan Gottlieb Augst from 1828, and from 1853 the married couple Józefa and Dominik Geisler. In May 1862 the Geislers sold half the property, corresponding to today's Piotrkowska 46, to the married couple Julianna and Wilhelm Stenzel. Stenzel resold it in November of the same year to Józef Rosenthal.

Construction of Rosenthal's house

It was Józef Rosenthal who erected in 1864 a single-storey brick building facing the street, known in specialist literature as the Józef Rosenthal Tenement. In April 1864 a complaint was filed with the Town Hall regarding irregularities in construction, specifically concerning scaffolding made of thin poles fastened with rope. The building represents eclecticism with classical and neo-Renaissance elements. It is entered in the heritage register under number A/69, with registration dated 20 January 1971, and in the municipal heritage inventory of Łódź under number 964.

From Rosenthal to Müller

In November 1870 Rosenthal sold the property to Szymon Heyman. Towards the end of the 1870s Heyman sold it to the married couple Rozalia and Icka, also called Józef, Auerbach. Shortly after them the pharmacist Fryderyk Müller acquired the property, appearing as owner in both the house tariff of 1920 and the inventory book of 1930-1936.

Shops, pharmacy and Reymont

Various firms operated on the ground floor and first floor of the tenement, including a warehouse of the cotton goods factory of Karol Steinert. At different periods it also housed a pharmacy, a piano and sheet music shop of the Gebethner and Wolff publishing house, a textile warehouse and a photographic studio. In 1897 Władysław Reymont stayed briefly in the building, gathering material for his novel "Ziemia obiecana" [The Promised Land]. The tenement is also visible in a photograph by Bronisław Wilkoszewski from 1896.

Practical information

• Address: ulica Piotrkowska 46, Śródmieście
• Getting there: on foot along the Piotrkowska pedestrian precinct or by tram to stops in central Łódź
• What to expect: a heritage tenement viewed from the precinct, in the vicinity of the former inn of Bartosz Wencl, the Rafał Sachs House and the Dawid Prussak Tenement