Jon Searles' photos with the keyword: Palac Adria

Here's a closeup of one of the irons.

Another thing in Palac Adria that I had never photographed before was this display of old gas appliances. Here you can see, from top to bottom, a heater, two irons (heated by a gas-fired cradle), and a small gas cooker (I don't know whether it was meant to be portable or just compact).

Divadlo Bez Zabradli is a theatre in Palac Adria in Prague, showing a full range of drama productions. I've never been to a show there, but I pass it a lot, and I discovered that I didn't have a photo of it...so here it is.

Although Kavarna Adria looks like it's been around forever, I read recently that it's in fact only been open since 2007. Is this true? In any case, even if it's not authentic, it definitely has the feel of an early-20th-century Bohemian kavarna.

This is the ship mosaic on the floor of Palac Adria. This one is actually a lot bigger than the steam locomotive one that I posted earlier.

Here's one of the mosaics in Palac Adria that I mentioned earlier. Being a railfan, this is the one that I always remember the best.

The main lobby of Palac Adria is round, with windows looking down from the Mezzanine level. It also features more fancy lighting fixtures, including this chandelier.

Here's the first of a series of interior shots that I did of Palac Adria, this one of one of the lighting fixtures. In spite of the appearance of this shot, I took this during the day.

Palac Adria aroused some controversy immediately post-1989 during privatisation of Prague's real-estate, when there was talk of selling it to a detergent company (or so the plan went, anyway, I know little about what ultimately happened). Vaclav Havel, who was president at the time, caught most of the flak, as he supported the sale, on the basis that a successful business could invest more money in its restoration than the government could. Critics thought it inappropriate to privatise a property of Palac Adria's architecural and historic significance, if god forbid it could be torn down or arsoned. For more on this, see the documentary film about Vaclav Havel "Obcan Havel," a.k.a. "Citizen Havel." In the end, it survived, and is today a successful office building, theatre, and coffeehouse, as seen here. Built in 1922-1925, and designed by Jakub Potucek, Palac Adria is considered a prime example of rondo-cubist architecture. It was originally supposed to be for an Italian insurance company, so there are a lot of interesting mosaics inside depicting the different types of insurance on offer.

This building on the right reminded me, of course, of the ornate Palac Adria in Prague, although this one is of course far less glamourous.