Lighting the Way: 7 Luminous Lighthouses in Poland
Although Poland is known for its beautiful beaches up north, it’s not often that one hears about noteworthy Polish lighthouses… As it turns out, the Polish coast of the Baltic Sea currently has a total of 15 in use. Join us on a tour featuring Poland’s oldest working lighthouse and Żeromski’s favourite!
The Stefan Żeromski lighthouse
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The Stefan Żeromski lighthouse in Rozewie, photo: Robert Neumann / Forum
We start off with the oldest working lighthouse in Poland, which stands at 1 Leon Wzorek Street in the village of Rozewie, near a sizeable seaside cliff. The Stefan Żeromski lighthouse was built in 1822 and it still serves its original purpose today, almost 200 years later. Originally, the building was 21 metres high and consisted of a four-storey stone base in the shape of a cut cone and a hexagonal lantern room. In the years 1910, and then 1978, it was expanded, as the trees in its vicinity obstructed its light. As a result, the stone base was preserved but a two-part, circular metal structure was built on top.
Today, the Żeromski lighthouse is almost 33 metres tall and its light can be seen from 26 nautical miles away. The stone base is covered with plaster and white paint whereas the metal section is painted a bright red. For those who enjoy looking out onto the vastness of the sea, the building is open to visitors.
In the 1930s, the lighthouse was named after the famous Polish writer Stefan Żeromski, who visited Rozewie often in the years 1920-1924. Apparently, he took a particular liking to the building and became friends with its lightkeeper, Leon Wzorek.
Żeromski’s ties to the lighthouse seem to go further:
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According to legend, Stefan Żeromski lived at the lighthouse for a while and wrote his novel Wiatr od Morza (Wind from the Sea) there. But this is only a legend. The writer never slept at the lighthouse and the book wasn’t written there. It was written in Gdynia.
Author
From mojepodrozeliterackie.blogspot.com, trans. MK
Well, we can at least imagine him have some tea with Wzorek, while looking out at the churning Baltic. That view has to be inspiring!
It’s worth noting that there is a second, younger lighthouse that still stands in Rozewie today. This 24-metre high building was raised in 1875, so that Rozewie would have two navigational lights and therefore be clearly distinguishable from other lighthouses in its vicinity. But unlike the first one, this lighthouse is no longer operational – its lights went out in 1910.
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The lighthouse in Darłowo, photo: Cezary Aszkiełowicz / AG
Whereas the first building on our list is the oldest of its kind our next lighthouse can be described as… the toughest in Poland. Out of all Polish lighthouses, it’s located closest to the coast and is therefore strongly affected by forces of nature. The lighthouse in the town of Darłowo is located in the local port, only 15 metres away from the shoreline. Its walls are well in reach of stormy waves and, in the wintertime, seawater often freezes on the lighthouse causing its walls to be covered with ice. Naturally, the dampness, ice and sea salt are detrimental to the building’s condition.
Despite these adverse circumstances the historic Darłowo lighthouse has made it to our times in good shape. We owe this to renovations as well as special measures taken to reinforce its structure.
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The wall facing the sea which was built, as the other ones, from ceramic brick was eventually covered with an additional layer of brick and covered with cement lime plaster. The total thickness of [this] wall after this reinforcement measures 54 centimetres.
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From latarnie.com.pl, trans. MK
Fortunately, the protective steps taken to preserve the Darłowo lighthouse, today we can still admire much of the original shape of the structure. It was raised in 1885 as a small red brick building with a square plan tower. In 1927, the tower was expanded with an extra storey, on top of which a lantern room with a steel dome was placed. Since then, the 22 metre tower hasn’t been modified. In the 1960s, an extra room was added to the eastern side of the building, but this expansion matched the original style of the Darłowo lighthouse and impacted its overall look only slightly. The Darłowo lighthouse still operates today; its light can be seen from 15 nautical miles away. The building is open to visitors.
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The lighthouse in Gąski, photo: Jerzy Pawleta / Forum
If you travel west from Darłowo, the next lighthouse you’ll find will be in the village of Gąski. This building is located close to a flat sandy beach and is surrounded by a forest. It was built in 1877 and measures a whopping 51 metres in height. The Gąski lighthouse is made up of three clearly visible elements: the brick base is octagonal and is 11.5 metres tall; on top of that stands a circular tower made of brick, that reaches 40 metres above ground level; above the tower there’s a glass and metal lantern room topped with a spherical ornament. Due to the fact that these three elements are easily distinguishable, the structure is said to have a classic lighthouse form:
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Such a shape of a lighthouse perfectly shows what the basic elements of every lighthouse are. […] One ought to know that every lighthouse consists of: a lantern room […], tower and base.
Author
From latarnie.com.pl, trans. MK
The Gąski lighthouse still operates today and its light is visible from 23.5 nautical miles away. It’s accessible to visitors, so you can climb up its 226 granite steps to enjoy some splendid views of the area. Next to the lighthouse there are three more historical buildings used by its light keepers – the whole thing is surrounded by a brick wall and is a beautiful complex.
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The lighthouse in Sopot (the balneotherapy centre’s tower), photo: Robert Neumann / Forum
While the Gąski lighthouse has a classic shape our next building looks more like a castle tower than a lighthouse. That’s because it was part of an eclectic building raised in the year 1904, and originally wasn’t actually meant to be a lighthouse. The lighthouse in question is located at 3 Zdrojowy Square in Sopot, near that city’s iconic pier.
The Sopot lighthouse was erected as an element of a balneotherapy centre (an establishment providing therapeutic baths). The centre included a boiler room and therefore needed to have a chimney. The building’s designers, Paul Puchmueller and Heinrich Dunkel, figured they could turn their chimney into something spectacular by building a tower around it. That’s how the 30 metre Sopot lighthouse was created.
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The building was erected in an eclectic style, with neo-Renaissance and neo-Baroque traits predominating, and with elements of Art Nouveau.
An observation point was created on top of the tower and navigation lights were installed. These, however, were too weak to grant the tower the status of a lighthouse. After World War II, the centre was turned into a hospital. The tower formally became a lighthouse only in 1977 after it was equipped with a stronger source of light, visible up to 17 nautical miles away. In 1999, the reach of its light was reduced to 7 nautical miles and lost its official lighthouse status. It’s still called a lighthouse for old times’ sake, though. The Sopot lighthouse is open to visitors.
Gdańsk Nowy Port lighthouse
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Gdańsk Nowy Port lighthouse, photo: Roman Jocher /AG
Next to Sopot lies the city of Gdańsk, where you’ll find our next lighthouse. It stands in the Nowy Port district, at 6a Przemysłowa Street. The Gdańsk Nowy Port lighthouse was raised in the year 1893 and measures 27.3 metres in height. It consists of a massive granite base, an octagonal tower made of red brick and a lantern room with a copper dome. The structure is adorned with elements of white sandstone.
On top of the lantern room there’s a nifty, old-timey device – a time ball. In olden days, it was used to signal the time to the crews of the ships docked nearby. Precisely at noon a large metal ball would descend from the top to the bottom of a mast installed above the lantern room, allowing sailors to adjust their clocks. Eventually, due to such advancements as radios, time balls became obsolete. It’s worth adding that the current time ball on the Gdańsk Nowy Port lighthouse is a 21st-century reconstruction, albeit a highly accurate one, of the original device that was destroyed by a storm in 1929.
The Gdańsk Nowy Port lighthouse is a registered architectural monument and is said to be similar to a legendary American lighthouse from Cleveland, which was torn down in 1901:
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Built in a Victorian Gothic style, the 1873 Cleveland Lighthouse is likely the most impressive lighthouse ever constructed in the United States. The […] eighty-three-foot tower [was] built of brick and accented with stone trimmings. […] Interestingly, a twin to Cleveland Main Lighthouse is Gdańsk Lighthouse in Poland. A delegation from Gdańsk visited Cleveland Lighthouse while attending the 1893 World Exposition in Chicago and had a similar tower constructed in Poland.
Author
From lighthousefriends.com
The Gdańsk Nowy Port lighthouse stopped serving its original purpose in 1984 when the more modern Gdańsk Port Północny lighthouse was opened in Gdańsk’s north harbour. The old building stood abandoned for many years, but finally reopened in 2004 after a renovation. Since then this much cherished Gdańsk landmark has been serving as a tourist attraction to people from all over the globe.
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The lighthouse in Niechorze, photo: Cezary Aszkiełowicz / AG
Like the Gdańsk Nowy Port lighthouse, our next specimen is also a registered monument. It’s picturesquely located near a seaside cliff in the village of Niechorze and is 45 metres tall. The Niechorze lighthouse was built of brick in the year 1866 and its form is said to reference mediaeval styles. Due to its beautiful architecture, the Niechorze lighthouse was dubbed the ‘most beautiful lighthouse on the Polish coast’ in a 2010 article by Eugeniusz Mazur:
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The base of the lighthouse is a rectangular building with symmetric, two-storey annexes. […] The tower has a rectangular plan up to the height of 19 metres, above that, it is octagonal. […] The tower ends with a cornice, on which there’s a viewing terrace (at the height of 35.7 metres), accessible via a winding staircase located inside the tower (210 steps). The structure is topped with a glass lantern room containing an optical device, covered with an arched, metal roof.
Author
From ‘Lighthouses of the Polish Coast as Unique Tourist Attractions’, trans. MK
A distinctive element of the architecture of the Niechorze lighthouse are the red and black brick pilaster strips that adorn its tower. The structure still serves its original purpose and its light can be seen from up to 20 nautical miles away. The building is open to visitors.
It’s worth adding that not far from the Niechorze lighthouse, at 16 Ludna Street, you can find the Lighthouse Miniature Park. Here, you’ll find 1:10 scale miniatures of all the lighthouses on the Polish coast!
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The lighthouse in Ustka, photo: Gerard / Reporter / East News
Another registered architectural monument is the Ustka lighthouse. This amazing brick building can be found at 1 Limanowskiego Street in the town of Ustka. It was built in 1892 and its tower measures 21.5 metres in height. The tower is adjacent to the pilot house – a structure meant for mariners tasked with manoeuvring ships through the harbour. The pilot house consists of two wings – one single-storey, the other two-storey. The entire complex was built in a neo-Gothic style:
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The lighthouse tower was built on an octagonal plan and is adjacent to the south-west corner of the pilot house. The tower has four storeys and is topped with a circular lantern room covered with a conical roof. The façades of the entire building received a sparing, neo-Gothic finish. The gables are topped with pinnacle-like embellishments and the tower is adorned with a brick, pointed arch, arcade cornice.
Author
From zabytek.pl, trans. MK
The Ustka lighthouse continues to serve its original purpose and its light can be seen from 18 nautical miles away. It’s a distinctive landmark of Ustka and is open to visitors.
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