Two spa facilities in Kyselka will undergo reconstruction for 60 million

photo: www.zachrante-lazne-kyselka.cz

Prague - By the end of this year, the reconstruction of two dilapidated buildings in the Kyselka spa, owned by Karlovarské minerální vody (KMV), could begin. New apartments are to be created in the Stallburg house, and a museum in the Löschner pavilion. According to KMV's CEO Alessandro Pasquale, the investor has reached an agreement with the Ministry of Culture, the Karlovy Vary Region, and the Kyselka municipality regarding the reconstruction of these two buildings, which will cost 60 million crowns.
Negotiations are underway for the reconstruction of five other buildings, three of which are owned by KMV and two by RSI (the successor of C.T.S. DUO), according to Pasquale. "We will strive to achieve consensus on the remaining five buildings, and I am confident we will succeed," Pasquale told reporters today.
The dilapidated Kyselka spa complex consists of a total of 13 buildings, and so far there is no rescue project for six of them. The spa has the status of a cultural monument, and according to the Ministry of Culture, the individual buildings are a historically and urbanistically valuable part of this unique complex. However, they suffered from the consequences of privatization in the 1990s, and due to long-term poor maintenance, they are in a state of disrepair.
The repairs of the Stallburg house and the Löschner pavilion, according to Pasquale, significantly exceed the scope of the minimum required by the law on state heritage care. For insufficient care of some heritage sites, KMV received a fine of 1.8 million crowns from the heritage care department of the Karlovy Vary municipal office at the beginning of the year.
Selected buildings will be repaired by the architectural studio Medika projekt. According to its executive Zdeněk Havlina, documentation for the zoning proceedings is currently being finalized, and they hope to obtain a building permit by autumn.
The Stallburg house was originally designed as residential in 1894. "The restoration will create eight nice apartments of various sizes here," Havlina noted. A museum with a café is planned to be established in the pavilion above the Löschner spring, which was built in the early 20th century.
According to Pasquale, it may not be possible to avoid the demolition of some buildings, though these will not be the ones owned by KMV. The demolition has been long criticized by the Association for the Protection and Development of Cultural Heritage of the Czech Republic (ASKORD), which initiated a petition for the rescue of the spa. On Wednesday, March 28, the Senate Committee on Education and Culture is expected to discuss the petition and the disputes concerning the Kyselka spa again.