Šaloun Villa

Brief Information

Šaloun Villa came about because of an oversized sculpture: Ladislav Šaloun won the competition for the monument to Jan Hus for Old Town Square, and his former studio on Wenceslas Square was not suitable for work on such a scale. So in Vinohrady he built a new studio building to his own design.

This helps one read the villa not as an ordinary artist’s house, but as a sculptor’s working tool. Inside there were an entrance hall, large and small studios, while the southern part, facing the garden and descending down the slope, included a salon, a study, technical rooms, and the administrator’s apartment. Today the building belongs to the Prague Academy of Fine Arts, but its original meaning is defined precisely by the studio.

What to Notice First

It is worth comparing three physical clues: the function, the shape of the plot, and the later extension. The large and small studios show that the building was planned for different scales of work, not only for the owner’s life. The southern part, descending down the slope toward the garden, explains why the rooms are not arranged as they would be in a level urban house: alongside the working area appeared a salon, a study, technical rooms, and the administrator’s apartment.

It is also worth keeping in mind the Art Nouveau style with elements of Symbolism: the sculptor designed the project himself, so the decorative language here is connected with the author’s own milieu, not only with the fashion of the time. The later living quarters, completed in 1934, add another layer of use to the studio. Even Josef Váchal’s account of an “occult cellar” changes the way one looks at the villa: cultural gatherings here could go far beyond ordinary studio work.