Karmelicka Street
The next block south of ul. Szczepańska is at ul. Shoemaker, which has a highly commercial character. At its end, the outline of the shoemaker's gate has been recreated. Along the street continuing the direction marked by Szewska, already outside Planty, further west, there is Karmelicka Street. It is true that it runs outside the area of Old Kraków, but it is impossible not to mention it, if only because of the Carmelite Church on Piasek Island or the memory of famous people living there. Houses at Karmelicka Street, erected in the style known as historicism and in the modernist fashion, they create a diversified development, but with good, urban class. It is worth paying attention at least to the original facade of the tenement house Pod Pająkiem designed by T.. Talowski (nr 35). At no. 6 a famous columnist lived, satirist, translator of French literature, the legend of the Green Balloon – Tadeusz Boy-Żelenski, a doctor by profession. At no. 27 Xawery Dunikowski, a sculptor, had his studio, a pod nr. 53 i 31 Stanisław Przybyszewski, the "demonic" writer, spent several years of his life full of scandals. Recently, Karmelicka Street has been completely renovated and turned into an elegant walking route. A joyful resurrection was recorded recently at no. 68. Well, in the low one, neglected for years, yet such a picturesque conservatory building with 1885 r. an original florist was set up with a stunning collection of cut and potted flowers.
Krakow was like an old dry widow, which suddenly fell from heaven of honey, charming lover: Krakow has gone mad! – this is how Boy-Żeleński wrote about the appearance of Stanisław Przybyszewski. Przybyszewski – The playwright and novelist, widely known among the European bohemians of the time, lived in Krakow for a short time, just from 1898 do 1901 r, but it played an epochal role in the cultural and social life of the city. The whole bohemian crowd was drawn to him, by wysłuchiwać wykładów o sztuce, sex, satan and love. Wherever he went, he created a narcotic and creative atmosphere around him. In the eyes of the noble townspeople, he was an alcoholic, demoralizatorem i uczniem szatana. His lush and dramatic personal life, in which creativity was intertwined with love for women, a fascination with death with admiration for musicians, was a constant source of rumors, scandals and jealousy. Przybyszewski was a modernist professing philosophy “art for art”, also associated with the milieu of German and Scandinavian modernists. His most important works include the novels Sons of the Earth, Children of Satan and the dramas of Topiel, Snow.
