3 - Riverfront Promenade with Row of Spa Buildings
After purchasing Kyselka, Heinrich Mattoni commenced building a spa complex including spa houses in addition to constructing a mineral water bottling plant. The spa complex originally stretched out into the valley of the Lomnický brook while spa houses were built along the road from the Hydrotherapy Institute towards the Grand Colonnade below Otto’s Spring. The main part of the complex of spa houses was designed in a depth axis with extensive vistas along the river. The road was transformed into a riverfront promenade in the style of a boulevard such as in Karlovy Vary or Bad Ems.
First of all, the building of a mineral water forwarding agency called Jindřichův dvůr (Henry’s Court) was built in the period from 1873 to 1875. Between 1890 and 1893 the structure was gradually architecturally developed by Viennese architect Karl Haybäck into its present appearance.
Between 1874 and 1875, Švýcarský dvůr (Swiss Court) was built in the vicinity to accommodate spa guests. Francophone regions of Switzerland were the model for the half-timbered structures with large saltire crosses. The year 1888 saw the total reconstruction of the structure with the expansion of its large loggia.
A half-timbered building with storerooms was built alongside Švýcarský dvůr in 1882, and was rebuilt in 1884–1885, perhaps based on the plans of Karlovy Vary builder Emanuel Grimm, into a large Kurhaus (“Cure House”). The edifice was later renamed after the wife of Heinrich Mattoni to Vilemínin dvůr (Wilhelmine’s Court). A Loading Building (“Verladehalle”), where crates containing mineral water were loaded on to wagons, adjoined it, as the ground floors of the buildings served the operating purposes of the bottling plant. Rails were laid on the riverfront in front of the buildings for a siding leading to the mineral water storehouses.
The building of the Spa Administration, originally a clerical house for administration and clerks’ flats, was built closely connected to the loading building. In 1894 “Stallburg” house with flats for seven families of Mattoni Company employees was built below a rocky promontory based on a design by Karl Haybäck.
The greatest development in the spa industry took place between 1873 and 1910 under Heinrich Mattoni. However, the First World War came as a shock, disrupting all walks of life; the spa tourism would never fully recover.
In 1948, the property of Heinrich Mattoni’s former factory in Kyselka was nationalised. Although the spa industry continued to serve its purpose, it never again reached the heights from Mattoni’s times. The bottling of mineral water was also separated from other spa activities. Following privatisation in the 1990s, the new owner of the Mattoni bottling plant, the company Karlovarské minerální vody a.s. (KMV), developed it into the successful form you see today. But the privatisation of spas was not so kind to other entities. As a result, spa activities were never restored to their former glory and former spa buildings began to fall into disrepair.
Today, a significant part of the spa complex is owned and being repaired by the charitable trust Lázně Kyselka, with the financial backing of KMV, which, at the same time, is also carrying out repairs on other historic buildings in Kyselka. Everyone is pulling together to restore buildings with the aim of making Kyselka an interesting tourist destination and to visually rejuvenate the atmosphere of the former spas, even if they are used for a different purpose today.