Lublin
— — the chapel where east meets west, in paint.
Not only on a wall.
“The largest Polish city east of the Vistula, set on the Lublin Upland between the Bystrzyca and Czechówka rivers. The Old Town climbs to a castle whose Holy Trinity Chapel carries Byzantine-Ruthenian frescoes from 1418, painted by Orthodox masters for a Roman Catholic king. The Union of Lublin was signed here in 1569. Majdanek sits on the southeastern edge.
Lublin, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Lublin lies on the Lublin Upland in eastern Poland, about 170 kilometres southeast of Warsaw and 95 kilometres from the Ukrainian border, between the Bystrzyca and Czechówka rivers. The city's population is around 336,000 (GUS 2022), the ninth largest in Poland and the largest east of the Vistula. The Catholic University of Lublin, founded 1918, and Maria Curie-Skłodowska University, founded 1944, anchor an academic centre that has drawn students from across Central and Eastern Europe for over a century.
Lublin Castle stands on a hill above the Old Town, with its keep dating to the 13th century and the Gothic Holy Trinity Chapel completed in 1418. The chapel's interior carries a complete cycle of Byzantine-Ruthenian frescoes commissioned by King Władysław II Jagiełło and painted by Orthodox masters from Ruthenia, an east-meets-west programme rare inside Roman Catholic Europe. The Krakowska Gate, built in the 14th century, marks the western entry to the Old Town. The Old Town itself is brick and stuccoed Renaissance burgher houses on cobbled streets.
Lublin's calendar carries the weight of its history. The Union of Lublin was signed in the city on 1 July 1569, joining the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania into the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Carnaval Sztukmistrzów, an international street arts festival, fills the Old Town each July. The Jagiellonian Fair brings craft and trade in August. Majdanek, on the southeastern edge of the city, was a Nazi German concentration and extermination camp from 1941 to 1944 and is preserved as a state museum.