Savings Bank

   
The Ditrichstein Palace (Ditrichštejnský palác) used to stand at the top of Masarykovo Square – formerly called Emperor Franz Joseph Square (Náměstí císaře Františka Josefa) – on the site of what is now the post office and savings bank buildings. The monumental three-storey building with a mansard roof and a "stone" shade of façade in the Baroque style was designed in 1785 by Jan Karel Hromádko, an engineer from Mikulov. During further structural changes, the building lost its uniform character. The layout was divided into two separate houses, with the eastern part on the corner of Masarykovo Square and Křížová Street undergoing significant alterations as an additional floor was built and the shape of the roof and the structure of the façades changed. Karel Havlíček Borovský stayed in this house during his studies in Jihlava between 1830 and 1831. At the turn of the century, the CentralCafé operated there until the demise of the house. In the larger western part of the former palace was the seat of the county court, and even earlier, the county office. In 1909, the City Savings Bank (Sparkasse der Stadt Iglau) bought the eastern house from the previous owner Johann Christ with the intention of rebuilding it as its headquarters. Soon afterwards, part of the old county court building was demolished in the immediate vicinity and a new building was constructed between 1910 and 1911 for the Post and Telegraph Office (Poštovní a telegrafní úřad) and the District Directorate of the Revenue Office (Finanční a daňový úřad). In 1911, the management of the Savings Bank asked the Municipal Authority for permission to demolish their building and to build a new one next to the new post office, which would better meet their requirements, at a cost similar to that of the remodelling of the old building, i.e. 250,000 crowns.

Unlike the post office building, where the project designer has not been identified, the designer of the Municipal Savings Bank building is documented and attributed to the architect and builder Arthur Corazza. Corazza also supervised the construction. The building stands on an L-shaped plot. The volume of the frontage is dynamically shaped and decorated with an Art Nouveau façade with geometric discoloured motifs. Everything is topped with a high mansard roof, which was originally covered with red flat ceramic tiles. The avant-corps with balconies and a canopy over the crown cornice culminates at the main entrance to the building from the square with a bell tower, which was originally topped with a clock face in a cartouche. Similarly accentuated is the side segmentally curved avant-corps with a side entrance from Křížová Street, where we can find an impressive entrance staircase embedded in the structure of the house, decorated in the arches with lattices featuring foliage and hedgehogs, symbols of Jihlava. In the corner under the polygonal oriel window, there is a decorative inscription in the plaster, reading "ARCH. CORAZZA 1913". The internal layout and furnishings underwent many later modifications, especially after 1951, when the entire building was taken over by the Communist leadership for the needs of the regional committee, and all the Art Nouveau interior disappeared. Despite that, at least the U-shaped stone staircase with a black terrace floor at the side entrance has been preserved. The well thought-out transitions of the individual elements on the façade and the gradation of volumetric elements with emphasis on the verticality of the building demonstrate Corazza's complex perception of the house as part of the surrounding urban whole and place the house among examples of the modern Baroque style, popular mainly in the German environment and characterised by an effort to distance itself from late historicism with modern forms.

Corazza, who designed and managed the construction, had already completed several projects in Jihlava, including Edmund Hoss' tenement house at Vrchlického Street 27, a factory complex for Richard Weissenstein at Srázná Street 17, a company building for Alois Neumann at Srázná Street 40, and a building for Josef Nägele at Znojemská Street 64. He also designed his own house at Jiráskova Street 7 and several other houses, including Franz Röder's house at Na Hliništi 9. He was also behind the design and construction of the first cinema in Jihlava, the Elite, in 1911, which later gave way to the construction of the Masaryk Jubilee Schools (Masarykovy jubilejní školy). After the war, Corraza's business and financial situation in Jihlava deteriorated and he returned to North Bohemia.

JL
Literature and other sources 

Next buildings on the trail