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Katowice In Your Pocket

Katowice In Your Pocketfot. Archiwum UM Katowice
As we trust and anticipate the arrival of spring after a brutal winter, In Your Pocket sends the highly-anticipated 15th issue of its peerless Katowice guide to the printer, which if you get your calculators out, means we’ve been on the scene here in Silesia for the last five years now. Though certain indicators (the miniscule number of hostels, ethnic eateries, guided tour companies and…well, tourists) would suggest that we’re still years ahead of the Silesian market, we continue to do the dirty work of exploring every mineshaft, swallowing every sour pickle and imbibing every unnecessary vodka shot in the service of putting together the best, most comprehensive guide to Poland’s least-appreciated region for those brave and bold enough to bear this torch aloft and explore its depths.

A lot can happen in five years, especially when the EU is cutting the checks, and though Silesia hasn’t gotten the play money of some other Polish cities, or the prestige of hosting this June’s Euro 2012 football tournament, the region is still cleaning up its act, reforming its image and seeing its stock steadily rise. Simultaneously bearing the marks of a post-industrial wasteland and modern metropolis, Poland’s largest urban conglomeration offers plenty of unusual outings and oddball attractions; take, for example, Spodek – the primary landmark and adopted icon of Katowice, which is either a flying saucer or orange juicer depending on the marketing campaign of the moment. If you’ve been coddled with the postcards plazas and gingerbread districts of pageant winners like Kraków, Prague and Vienna, you may find it hard to see the beauty of their unkempt step-sister Silesia. However, history reveals that this hard-working wench has been pursued by every prince in the area for centuries, and we go to great pains in a feature on the Silesian Uprisings to describe the fateful duel Germany and Poland had over her hand in the aftermath of WWI. Though the word ‘tourism’ is rarely spoken in these parts without being preceded by ‘industrial,’ if you’re searching for the fairer side of Silesia, we’ve recently uncovered an absolute gem in Promnice Hunting Lodge, and spring is an excellent time to explore some of the largest parks in Europe with Chorzów’s enormous, activity-rich Park of Culture & Recreation at the forefront. A quick look around, supplemented by an immersion in Katowice’s vastly under-rated nightlife will also teach you the last thing you need to know about enjoying Silesia: for every miner, there’s a miner’s daughter.

Thanks for being here, and enjoy Silesia.


A Bit About Katowice to Begin

One of Poland's least known and most surprising destinations, Katowice is a relatively young, predominantly working class city with a history tied up with the extraction of coal and other manly pursuits. Beginning life as a small, German-speaking town called Kattowitz in the early part of the 19th century, Katowice was incorporated within the borders of a new post-WWI Polish state, and thanks to its disparate racial and cultural heritage offers visitors a fascinating jumble of German Gothic, inter-war Art Nouveau and some shockingly different socialist architecture, all intermingled with a growing number of glistening capitalist palaces. Currently reinventing itself as a serious business destination and sadly ignored as a place to visit for any other reason, a sneaky glimpse under the cultural carpet reveals, among other delightful surprises, Poland's largest cathedral, one of the best museums in southern PL, a vast park filled with truly magnificent things to see and do, a bar scene to shame many of the country's so-called cutting edge cities and a reinforced concrete building that looks like a spaceship and plays music from Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Marvellous.

Our Katowice Highlights