The former art nouveau gem of Aradi street, 57 Aradi street

In Aradi street, a few minutes walk from Kodály körönd (circus - ed.), passersby are greeted by the building known as Platschek-house (also seen as Piatschek).

Source: 24.hu

The property under number 57 was owned by Lipót Auguszt, jail warden, and his wife, Aloyza Günther, in 1882, then Tivadar Hüttl acquired it in 1885. In 1907, Vilmos Platschek clothier and his wife Vilmosné Platschek née Cecília Grünwald commissioned the Löffler architect brothers, Béla and Sándor Samu, for a large, high-standard apartment building. The brothers had been working together since 1906, designing buildings in the style of the time: art nouveau, until around World War I. Out of all their architectural works in Pest, the most famous is the orthodox synagogue on Kazinczy street. This one has a nontraditional, beautiful building, its own apartment house and community houses surrounding them.

Source: lathatatlan.ovas.hu

The plans for 57 Aradi street were made in 1907 and the house was finished in 1908. The house built in art nouveau style is U-shaped, expanded with a multi-storey annex in the back end. The main building has three floors, each level has two apartments, one with 4 rooms, one with 5 rooms. Their kitchens were once accessible via the service-stairs, which is reminiscent of towers of fairy tale castles on the outside, but can be challenging to climb inside. Workshops opened to the street, the raised basement on the side was the place for the stables and the annex became the carriage house. The latter gives the impression of Medieval Spanish castles, especially some of Gaudi's countryside castles, with the closed battlement-style walls, a terrace lined with cast stone planters and the spiral staircase next to it rising up like a tower.

Source: lathatatlan.ovas.hu

The interesting, restructured facade ends with a carved wooden-beamed ledge and an arched central gable, while in the corners, like some guardians, small creatures are crouching down, reminiscent of the Medieval ages. The entrance was formerly roofed with glass, above it juts out a closed balcony, its large windows flanked by atlantes hunched under the weight, like their ancient ascendants.

Source: multimento.blog.hu, lathatatlan.ovas.hu

The gate and the insides are covered in the most prominent animal of art nouveau, the peacock in unusually graceful motifs. These can be seen on the embossed plate gate of József Migray, master locksmith, on the acid-etched glass of the door between the carriageway and the yard, on the wrought-iron rails of the staircase and even on the first floor, in the corners of the gallery, which expands into terrazzo surfaced arched balcony.

Source: lathatatlan.ovas.hu

Enikő Tolnay-Pálóczy, art historian, discovered that the surprisingly graceful peacocks and the ermines on each side of the lobby under the barbell vault have prefigurations. These can be found in Verneuil's ornamentation book, published in 1897. Also, the mosaic floor tiles remained intact in the lobby and the staircase landings, showing blue-green-brown flower motifs. These were produced in a factory of one of the biggest cement manufacturers, József Walla, Jr.: in their registry dated 1908 they are listed under Item 184. It's not just the peacock used as a decorative motif, though. Its curling tailfeathers can also be seen on the gate, the rails of the stairs, the doors of the apartments, with fine, stylized details. These are surrounded by plants, cypress-like flowers and, on the coloured glasses of the staircase windows, rose- decorated pine trees.

Source: lathatatlan.ovas.hu

Finally, to top it all off, while on the outside the building is guarded by small creatures, inside, on the ceiling of the staircase, a floating angel watches over the residents and the house.

Source: lathatatlan.ovas.hu

The address registry dated 1910 does not show very rich tenants of the house. Besides Vilmos Platschek clothier, it was occupied by József Nánay store-keeper, Sándor Kozma tailor, Miksa Holczweber factory scribe, József Grünwald rentier, Dávid Grossmann master butcher and Miksa Glauber rentier.

The house was bought by Józsefné Perlmann in 1926, then by Zsigmond Grünfeld and his partners in 1931.

Source: multimento.blog.hu

Source: lathatatlan.ovas.hu, 24.hu, meselohazak.hu, multimento.blog.hu