Kurortny Prospekt (Resort Avenue)

13 points1 km1 hour

Route author

Susanin Team

Things to do

📜 Learn the city's history
🏛️🕰️ Compare the eras

Route points (13)

Friedrich Bast's Apartment Building in Zelenogradsk

Point on route “Kurortny Prospekt (Resort Avenue)”

Point 3

Friedrich Bast's Apartment Building

🏟️ Architectural landmark • 📜 Historic site

Historical Background

This used to be an apartment building and a guesthouse. They are decorated so similarly that they look like a single building, but a careful eye will quickly spot the differences. Each building had its own main entrance on Cranz's main street; before the war, the address was 47 Königsberger Strasse. The property belonged to Friedrich Bast, who rented it out.

Architecture

The apartment building is in the East Prussian Art Nouveau style. On the facade you can see a circle symbolizing the sun with four rays coming out of it. The front door has molded decoration in the shape of flowers, with plant motifs spreading out in all directions. The upper levels are half-timbered, that is, built on a timber frame. The building has projecting bays with windows, with a gabled roof between them. On the ground floor of the bays, green glazed tiles can still be seen under the windows. Sadly, the windows with their unique ornaments have been replaced with plastic ones. Only three windows on the north side of the building still have their beautiful original frames.

Story

A dentist named Pankow had his practice in the first entrance of the apartment building at 48 Königsberger Strasse. The Cranz address book (Adressbuch) of the 1930s also records that Dr. Pankow chaired the Cranz Military Veterans' Society, founded in 1892. The doctor's first name was only discovered this year, thanks to the archive of the magazine “Unser schönes Samland” (“Our Beautiful Samland”), published in Germany. The dentist's name was Werner Pankow.