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The villa’s history
Vila Primavesi is an Art nouveau villa located in Olomouc. It was constructed between 1905 and 1906 for the banker Otto Primavesi and his wife, actress Eugenia.
Viennese architects Franz von Krauss and Josef Tölk envisioned the residence as a modern artistic house, organizing the interior around a main hall that served as the hearth of the family’s social and public life.
The Primavesi family lived in the villa for about twelve years.
Following the Austro-Hungarian Empire’s collapse in 1918, political and economic changes stripped them of influence and wealth.
As German ceased to be the dominant language and the Czech crown lost value, their financial situation deteriorated, prompting then to sell the property and relocate to Vienna.
In 1926 doctor Koutný purchased the villa and converted it into a private hospital, significantly altering the original interior to create hospital rooms, maternity wards, and patient quarters.
After Koutný’s death, doctor Pospíšil took over in 1939, managing the facility through World War II until the state nationalized it in 1952, transforming it into a public health centre – several old people of Olomouc say they were born in the villa.
The following decades brought further deterioration through modifications, removal of furnishings, and lack of maintenance, resulting in a significant loss of the original artistic elements.
Even though the villa was declared a cultural monument in the 1980s with restoration plans already drafted, financial difficulties stalled the project.
After 1989, the property was returned to the former owner’s family, and in 1992 a reconstruction company took over, but it failed quickly.
The firm went bankrupt, leaving the building abandoned, damaged, and vulnerable to theft and material loss.
The villa’s interiors
The Primavesi became influential patrons of Vienna’s artistic elite, hosting lavish salons at their estate and supporting the Wiener Werkstätte design movement.
Their villa rapidly emerged as Olomouc’s premier cultural centre, attracting prominent figures from Austrian, Czech, and Moravian artistic circles.
Architect Josef Hoffmann, painter Gustav Klimt, and sculptor Anton Hanak contributed significantly to the villa’s aesthetic and rich internal decoration.
Hanak designed the wooden staircase of the central hall, the dining room furnishings, and numerous other decorative details, such as the radiators covers and the fireplace in the central hall that bears a German inscription reflecting on the idea that life moves forward.
Klimt created seventeen paintings for the family, including a portrait of Eugenia (now in Japan’s Toyota Museum) and the celebrated portrait of their daughter Mäda – a 2m tall composition that stands as Klimt’s only major painting of a child and is now part of the collection at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
A legend surrounds both portraits: completed at the last moment, they were shipped from Vienna to Olomouc by mail.
A twelve-panel stained-glass window in the main hall displays a panoramic view of Olomouc based on a 1706 engraving, depicting the city’s historic churches, gates, and streets.
The ground floor housed the kitchen, dining room, and the master’s and lady’s rooms, while the upper floors featured bedrooms, a bathroom, and a governess’s quarters. Guest and servant accommodations occupied the mansard roof, and the basement hosted a power generator, a central vacuum system, and a wine cellar, testifying to the family’s wealth.
Vila Primavesi today
Restoration began in 1996 when the granddaughter of doctor Pospíšil undertook the reconstruction using private funds and state support.
Lost artworks and furnishings were found in museums and collections, many of which were gradually recovered and restored.
Despite thefts and incomplete reconstructions, the villa was gradually revived, leading to the opening of guided tours in 2018 and the restoration of its cultural significance.
Today, the villa serves mixed functions: the underground floor houses a café, the upper floors contain offices, and apartments, and selected interiors have been reconstructed in Art Nouveau style.
Part of the building remains open to the public through guided tours and functions as a cultural and social venue, preserving the legacy of one of the most important examples of Art Nouveau architecture in Central Europe while reflecting its complex history of artistic creation, social life, decline, transformation, and restoration.
You can experience the villa’s beauty yourself by joining one of the tours or events at the villa or by watching this reportage from Česká televize (although it’s old and in Czech, it offers a good visual introduction).
How to get there
Vila Primavesi is in the centre of Olomouc, which makes it pretty easy to reach.
I bet you don’t want me to tell you how to reach Olomouc, though!
