Visiting The Palace Of Culture

It's been my plan to visit the amazing and beautiful architectural gem, that is called Palace of Culture for some time. The pandemic and the restrictions that came with it has made life a bit more difficult, but restrictions have been eased, so the time for me finally has come.

The Palace situates in the heart of Targu Mures (Marosvásárhely) and dates back to 1913, which means it's 108 years old now. From architectural point of view, it's an absolute beauty, a masterpiece that attracts a lot of tourists from all around the world.

The Palace of Culture was built between 1911 and 1913 to the request of mayor György Bernády by Marcell Komor (1868-1944) and Dezső Jakab (1864-1932).

The Art Nouveau edifice, designed in Secession style, has 3 buildings: the main building, the right building and the left building. Above of the Entrance Hall is the Mirrors' Hall, located on the first floor of the building. With a capacity of 700 seats, the multifunctional Concert Hall forms the central part of the building. Its height corresponds to the three levels of the building. With more than 200 seats, the Small Hall, beautifully decorated with floral motifs, is used for cultural and scientific conferences, and for various recitals and concerts. source

The Palace is on the corner of the street. It has an entrance on both sides.

What you see here is the entrance used when there are concerts. The architecture here is quite interesting, it's featuring the entrance of the fortress. The door is made if iron and it's quite heavy to open.

Unfortunately at the time of my visit the weather was pretty gloomy, overcast, so I'm doing the best I can with these photos, but even so, you can see how beautiful the decoration of the building is.

This is the side entrance, which basically is the main entrance. This is where you enter when you want to visit the Palace. The decoration above the doors is something I admired for ten minutes or so. The windows, the scenes carved in metal beneath the windows are real artworks.

Fees & How To Get There

The Palace in the city center, next to the mayor's office, you can't miss it as everyone knows where it is. You can take any bus to the city center,a taxi or you can drive there. There's a big underground parking lot under the national theater nearby, where you can leave your car.

Fees are very reasonable, compared to museum prices in other countries. It's 16 lei for adults, which is roughly €3.2. On the ticket there are the three museums you can visit inside the Palace, on the back there's a map with the four museums the city has. I've been able to visit three of them so far, one is left when I'm visiting next. One other thing you have to know, a green pass is needed to enter. Unvaccinated people are not allowed in.

The bad news is that photographing is allowed only in certain places, which is the hall, the big concert hall and that's all. At the most beautiful place, which is the hall of mirrors, photographing is not allowed, but stay tuned as I have a surprise for you :)

The Hall

As you enter the building, in the hall, on both sides there is on marble plate listing all the contributors donating to the project. These were the nobles of the time, capable of supporting financially these projects.

Beneath the marble plates there's a basin that must have been a place for pouring water, like a fountain back in those days.

There are six heavy iron doors, of which only two are in use right now, one for entering and the other for exiting. This is where you have to show your green pass again.

This is the hall and I must admit, it left me without words. Just like in Vienna, at the Schönbrunn Palace, I stood there in silence and tried to imagine those nobles entering the Palace all dressed up accordingly and speaking the language of those days. Every visit to these century old places is a visit back in time for me.

The floor is made by marble, the stairs as well and the mirrors on both ends are from Venice, Italy. Unfortunately the lights have taken away from the photo quality, but it is what it is, I have to be ok with it.

In the hall there are several sculptures, featuring famous people of those times, among which the bust of Franz Joseph I of Austria, Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, Croatia, and Bohemia, and monarch of other states of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, from 2 December 1848 until his death.

The bust of his wife, Empress Elisabeth of Austria, born as born Duchess Elisabeth in Bavaria, mostly known as Sissi.

This is the entrance of the big concert hall, with its metal doors and the marble support columns, holding the relief artwork above the door, which is featuring the coronation of Franz Joseph I of Austria, who was also King of Hungary. The official name of Targu Mures was Marosvásárhely in those times and was part of Hungary. This artwork was taken off as soon as Transylvania became part of Romania and hidden in the basement, covered by gravel. It was found a few years ago by mistake, restored and put back to its original place.

The upper part of the walls are decorated with scenes from folk ballads. This one is from 1915.

These are the most famous ones, about the wife of Kőműves Kelemen.

Kelemen, and 12 other bricklayers, are trying to build the castle of Déva. Every time they finish, it collapses. Believing themselves to be at the mercy of an old curse, they make an agreement; whoever's wife first appears in the construction area of the castle, will have their throat cut, corpse burned, and have her ashes mixed with the whitewash for the building. It is Kelemen's wife that makes a visit first, against the advice of her husband. The bricklayers murder her, and build her into the walls of the castle. The walls do not collapse this time, and the masons get their payment. Kelemen goes home, to see his son to tell him what he did. His son decides to visits the castle. Arriving at the spot where his mother died, he dies from his grief. source

Painted Windows

As I mentioned above, the stairs are also made of marble and the ceiling is also nicely decorated.

Halfway up, each level has these painted glass windows with famous people's portrait of those times. This one is featuring Jókai Mór, the famous Hungarian writer.

The two windows on the side are also amazing.

On the first floor there's a marble plate that dates back to 1912, when the first public city library was inaugurated, founded by Dr. Bernády György, the mayor of Marosvásárhely at that time. The library is in the building but has a separate entrance in the back. I'm going to show you photos about it in my upcoming post.

There are two staircases, one on each side of the big concert hall. On the right side, at the first level Liszt Ferenc is featured, the most famous Hungarian musician of the 19th century.

At the top level there was an art exhibition,so paintings were hanging on the wall.

The Palace was built to serve the culture and therefore it's still serving its purpose. There are concerts organized here very often, spectacles, exhibitions and there are several libraries that are free.

In my next post I'm going to show you the big concert hall, the mirror hall and more, so stay tuned.