Builders signed a contract for the renovation of Arnold's villa in Brno for 148 million CZK

Brno – Representatives of two construction companies and the director of the Museum of the City of Brno, Zbyněk Šolc, signed a contract today for the renovation of Arnold's villa in Brno's Černá Pole at the New Town Hall. The museum took over the management of the villa, making it the official investor of the renovation, which will cost nearly 148 million crowns.

"I am glad that we managed to secure funds both from Norwegian funds and from the state budget; the total amount obtained in grants is 38.5 million crowns, but the overall project costs nearly 148 million crowns, which is not an insignificant amount," said Brno's mayor Markéta Vaňková, who attended the signing of the contract.

The Art Nouveau villa will become a Center for Dialogue, aimed at both lay and professional audiences interested in architecture and the history of the 19th to 21st centuries. In addition to a permanent exhibition on the history of Arnold's villa and the personality of the builder Josef Arnold, there will be an information center for the Brno Architectural Manual, which focuses on mapping modern Brno architecture. The building will feature a multifunctional hall, spaces for workshops and symposia, or co-working offices for exhibition curators and event organizers, and a café will also be part of the space.

The public procurement for the extensive reconstruction was won by Unistav Construction and SKR stav, which previously worked on the renovation of the neighboring Tugendhat villa. "One of the first things we will need to address is the access road from Černopolní Street. Work inside the building will then begin in January, where it will be necessary to clean and remove everything that does not belong in the space, including the flooring. Only after we uncover things that have not yet been visible will we meet with the conservationists and agree on the next steps," said Michal Malásek from Unistav, who will oversee the construction.

All work on the villa must be completed by March 2024, which was a condition for drawing the grant. In addition to the renovation of the villa itself and its transformation into a Center for Dialogue, a revitalization of the garden and its expansion onto another plot is planned. The garden will be connected to the neighboring Löw-Beer villa, creating a new passage from Lužanky to Černá Pole.

The house stands in close proximity to the accessible Tugendhat and Löw-Beer villas, but it is older. It was built for the builder Josef Arnold in the 1860s. The last private owners of the villa perished during World War II. From the 1950s until 2013, the villa served as a kindergarten and then was left vacant. During a historical and architectural survey, several original elements were found, such as flooring and window fittings.