Wstępne badania konserwatorskie południowej ściany loggii pałacu Pod Krzysztofory w Krakowie

PRELIMINARY CONSERVATION RESEARCH ON THE SOUTH WALL OF THE LOGGIA OF KRZYSZTOFORY PALACE IN KRAKÓW Preceded by a polychrome detection analysis, the architectural research on the south wall and ceiling of the arcaded loggia at Krzysztofory Palace located at 35 Rynek Główny, Kraków was completed in 2000. The aim of the research was to evaluate the possibilities of carrying out the works included in the architectural development plan for the palace’s courtyard. Research results have revealed that the east wing of Krzysztofory Palace – in the section that later became the arcaded loggia – was built in the late Gothic stage. In its functional and spatial form, this wing was in the 16th century described as a separate “house in a side street”. The arcaded loggia was added to it in the last quarter of the 17th century as part of a larger construction project undertaken to alter the functional and spatial character of this plot in order to integrate and transform the buildings into a baroque city mansion. During the construction of the loggia, stone corbels supporting the curves of the lunettes of the cross-barrel vault spanning above the loggia, masonry of the portals and of the basement windows, as well as the frame of the chimney cleanout door were installed on the back elevation wall of the “house in a side street”. The later construction works carried out in this wing of Krzysztofory Palace did not bring any substantial changes, the only notable exception, perhaps, being the facing of the loggia’s columns in the mid-19th century due to their appalling static condition. The columns were transformed into massive pillars, however, the facing was to be removed in the course of another large-scale renovation and conservation project accomplished in the first quarter of the 20th century by Wacław Krzyżanowski. The wide baroque chimney cleanout door was permanently closed also at that time. The layer of colourful painted decoration surviving on the ceiling (grey and ochre, in a shade that matches the stonework of the loggia) also dates from that period. In the second half of the 20th century, the 18th-century exit of the northernmost room on the ground floor leading into the loggia was bricked in, the plasterwork was removed, and sections of the front parts of historical elements were hacked off.