Dwór Ledóchowskich: A Classical Manor House in Poland
Site at a Glance
- Rating
- 3.6
- Popularity
- Very Low
- Country
- Poland
- Primary era
- Modern
- Eras represented
- Modern
- Civilizations
- Habsburg
- Site type
- Domestic
- Remains
- Manor House
On this page7 sections
History
Dwór Ledóchowskich is a Classical manor house in Lipnica Dolna, Poland, built between 1830 and 1835 for Kazimierz Janota-Bzowski. Its construction formed part of a plan to create an eastern frontage for a new market square after a fire devastated Lipnica in 1828.
The planned New Town
The proposed settlement, known as the New Town, was never completed. Bzowski funded a statue of Saint Florian in 1837, intending it to protect the new community from fires. The statue was placed at the centre of the planned square and remains there. Bzowski had owned the land since the end of 1834.
The Lgocki and Ledóchowski families
In 1872, the Lipnica estates and manor were purchased by Count Kazimierz Lgocki of the Orla, or Szaszor, coat of arms. He was married to Kamilia Tatmajer of Łopuszna. Since the Lgockis seldom stayed in Lipnica, the manor had fallen into serious disrepair by the late 1870s.
In 1883, the family of Antoni Halka Ledóchowski moved into the manor from Austria. Ledóchowski was an imperial and royal chamberlain and bore the Szaława coat of arms. His daughters, the future Saint Ursula Ledóchowska and the future Blessed Maria Teresa Ledóchowska, lived at the manor for several years. Saint Ursula later became a Catholic religious leader and founded the Ursuline Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. She was canonized in 2003. Blessed Maria Teresa became associated with missionary work and was beatified in 1975.
War, changing uses, and renewal
The Ledóchowski family retained the manor for more than 60 years, until the Second World War. German authorities displaced the family during the war. Valuable household objects were distributed among residents of Lipnica, while the furnishings that remained were later looted. Around a dozen family-related exhibits are now preserved at the convent of the Ursuline Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in Lipnica Murowana.
After the war, an agricultural production cooperative operated in the former grange. The manor itself served successively or concurrently as a school, a militia post, and residential accommodation. Since the 1980s, the building has belonged to the Diocesan Curia in Tarnow. A comprehensive renovation followed, and the manor now houses the Urszula Ledóchowska Catholic Center for Social Studies. In 2003, two rooms were adapted as a small museum devoted to the Ledóchowski family, particularly Saint Ursula. The museum presents family memorabilia and testimonies concerning the family’s history.
Remains
Dwór Ledóchowskich is a two-storey masonry manor on a rectangular plan, designed in the Classical style after French rural palaces. Its hipped roof, which slopes on all sides, is covered with tiles. The principal front has five bays and a recessed portico, a column-supported entrance porch, with four columns. Above the entrance is a balcony formed as a loggia, a roofed open-sided gallery integrated into the facade.
Manor house
The ground floor originally contained five rooms and a large hall, while the first floor had seven rooms and a balcony. A covered porch linked the manor to a service building that contained rooms for household staff. The porch extended towards the park and included four modest rooms overlooking it. The property was enclosed by a high stone wall with a grand entrance gate, whose pillars carried stone lions.
Park and memorial features
A forest south of the manor occupies the area that formerly served as the park. At the end of a nearby clearing stands a grotto of the Virgin Mary built in 1975. It replaced a statue that had stood on the site of an earlier wooden chapel. Very little of the original interior furnishing survives. The manor museum displays a modest group of family memorabilia and historical testimonies, while approximately a dozen related exhibits are held at the Ursuline convent in Lipnica Murowana.
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