The tour starts with a visit to Księży Młyn – an amazing industrial district where you feel as if time had stopped. You will take a walk around the buildings of Karol Scheibler’s factory, which in the 19th century formed a city within the city, and the factory of Izrael Poznanski, nowadays converted to a shopping and entertainment centre called Manufaktura.
We will not let you miss the largest palace in Lodz, which also once belonged to the manufacturer Izrael Poznański, or “the king of cotton”. You will also pay a visit to the famous “White Factory” of Ludwig Geyer – an treasure of Poland’s industrial architecture. Next to the Geyer’s Factory you will find a Museum of Urban Wooden Architecture. There, you can admire the original examples of wooden houses, which were built in Lodz. Afterwards you will take a walk along famous Piotrkowska Street, probably the longest shopping street in Europe.
However, one cannot forget that the history of the city was shaped by the co-existence of four nations, Polish, German, Jewish and Russian. The Jewish people made up about one third of the city’s population and owned one third of all the factories. That is why, the next part of the sightseeing will be devoted to following the legacy of the Jewish inhabitants of Lodz. The first stop will be the biggest Jewish cemetery in Europe, then you will head for Radegast railway station, once the departure point to the death camps in Chełmno and Auschwitz. You will visit the areas of the former Litzmannstadt Ghetto, one of the most remarkable ghettos. Then, you see the only remaining synagogue in Lodz, the only one to survive WW2. Nowadays, it is open for Jewish religious services.
