The Mendelsohn House is the first building designed by the expressionist architect Erich Mendelsohn, built between 1911 and 1912. It is formed by two buildings, the Bet Tahara (Pre-Burial Jewish House or House of Consecration) and the House of the keeper.
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History of the building.
Born in Olsztyn the 21st March 1887, after his studies Mendelsohn moved to Berlin where he designed the Einstein Tower (situated in Potsdam), the astrophysical observatory that made him famous. Nobody knew that his very first work, the Bet Tahara, was in Olsztyn, so the Mendelsohn House has been forgot by everybody.
The Bet Tahara was built from 1911 to 1912 as a component of the Jewish cemetery of Olsztyn that was already existing since 1818. Mendelsohn create this project during his studies at the Munich Technical University, and had the chance to realize it.
During World War II, the Jewish community in Olsztyn was destroyed in the Holocaust hecatomb, luckily several Jews have managed to escape abroad. After WWII Warmia and Masuria region became the scene of strong migration movements. That is why at the present, except of Poles there are also living Germans, Ukrainians, Russians and some Jews as well.
Unfortunately Olsztyn Jewish community had never reborn in the shape as it existed before 1939, with the open synagogue (burned down during Nazis occupation) and the cemetery.
Years passed by and in the 1950s the buildings were modified and became the location of the National Archives until 1996. A couple of years later the roots of the Bet Tahara have been discovered and the Association of Olsztyn’s Fancies with the help of the Fundacja Borussia restored it. The restoration project has been made with the support of European Founds (“Operation Program Warmia and Mazury 2007-2013 ) The 21st March 2013, in the occasion of the 126th anniversary of the Mendelsohn's birth, the Bet Tahara, now called Mendelsohn House, has been inaugurated as Intercultural Dialogue Center. Now the house of the keeper hosts the Borussia's offices, and the Mendelsohn House is used for concerts, expositions, workshops and it is possible to visit it.
Description of the buildings
The Mendelsohn House is a beautiful couple of Jewish buildings that were used to prepare Jewish burial ceremonies. Its history is deeply linked to the Jewish culture and the search for information leads automatically to the Jewish habits and tradition.
In the Jewish culture the body is always hidden from the public and it is washed and dressed by a group of people, the Chevra Kadisha, that conduct this ceremony as volunteers. The Chevra Kadisha, the sacred society, is a group of pious men and women who have taken on the obligation of ritually preparing the deceased. They perform the Taharah, which means purification. These people ritually bathe the deceased and then dress the person in Tachrichim, shrouds, the Traditional burial garments. The Mendelsohn House has been shaped to be the perfect spot to organize and complete these tasks.
The entrance of the first building was dived in three small rooms one adjacent the others. The door conduced into the central room and at the left there was the bathe chamber where the dead bodies were washed following the Jewish rules. This ceremony was private, that's why the room was closed by walls, now the walls don't exist anymore, but it is still possible to found their marks on the floor and on the other main walls. The decoration of this room has been deduced from some small pieces of the original plaster and mosaic that during the years have been covered with new layers of plaster and colors. The care that Mendelsohn took to design this room is probably the reflect of the importance that it had: the corners where the walls meet the ceiling are rounded and the ceramics on the bottom part of the walls are of a bright white, the upper part has been designed by blue rectangles and lines that create the boundaries of big parts of plaster. Probably in the center of each square there was a decoration but, due to the horrible condition of the building (between 1996-2006) and the works that had been made before the restoration, it is impossible to clearly understand the shape, it is just possible to see some blue small dots.
At the other side of the main chamber there is what was thought to be one room, but it was discovered later that it was divided in two. The real function of this spot is unclear, it could probably be two dressing rooms for the Chevra Kadisha members: there is an exhaust pipe (there is one also in the bathe chamber) that could be used to warm up the water. Strangely the pipes are completely clean.
The central room, the atrium, is in between the bathe chamber and the dressing rooms and it is the first room after the entrance. With a dark pavement and dark purple walls it could be the metaphorical entrance into the death.
The most important room it is, without doubts, the consecration hall. This room was the one where the ceremony used to take place. The big central space is enclosed by a gallery, three columns at each side describe two small corridors illuminated by three windows. The original white floor is decorated by a black Star of David in the center, that correspond perfectly to the center of the dome. All the way around the gallery there was the Hebrew inscription "And if thou draw out thy soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall the light rise in the obscurity, and thy darkness be as noon day" from the Isaiah's book 58:10. We know about this particular because Mendelsohn himself took some photos and kept them in his archives. In one of them it is clearly readable part of this verse.
Extremely important is the roof, probably the finest expression of the Mendelsohn's genial mind. The Jewish law states that the Koheni (the Priest) and the dead body can't be under the same roof. Mendelsohn found a special solution to this problem: he build two domes one in the other, where the internal one do not touch the external one, creating this way two roofs. While the external one creates the shape of the entire building, the internal one gives personality to the central room. Of square shape, the dome rise up decorated by blue and green mosaics that, from the bottom the line where the ornament with the Isaish's book quotation was to the peak of the roof, design lines and patterns. At the peak, in correspondence of the Star of David of the floor, there is another Star of David, smaller, but far brighter, made of golden pieces. The contrast between the soft and the dark parts of the mosaic makes the golden parts even shiner of how they effectively are, creating a spot of light right in the center of the dome. It is now possible to observe the structure of the domes by going upstairs where some windows have been created to show visitors the Mendlsohn’s architectural trick.
The last room is at the opposite side of the commemoration room and it can be defined as the Koheni room. This chamber was dived in three, now is an open space. The central part was probably the spot where the body was taken and placed on the chariot that will lead the body to the cemetery passing thought a big door where on the top was written in Hebrew "For surely there is an end; and thin expectation shall not be cut off" from the Proverbs' book 23:18. The left part was the room where the Kohenim prepared themselves for the ceremony, there is, in fact, another door, probably the priest-door, because the Kohenim are not allowed to pass from the same door as dead body.