Once, Łódź was pretty much all concrete and brick, but today it’s full of parks and greenery – all of which contain interesting elements like water features, monuments, benches, old trees and more. 
But few parks in the city have the kind of strange history that Park Helenów does. It was built in 1881 by a group of brothers who owned a nearby brewery (and thus, the surrounding land) and decided to turn that land into a park. They built two ponds with a boat dock along the river, water fountains, a lush garden, rose alleys, a tennis court, pear trees and more.
But one of the strangest – and most popular – features was a “wildlife park” inside the park itself; basically, this was a mini zoo with two bears, a trained chimpanzee, deer, boars, peacocks and other animals. Over the years, they brought in seals, otters, a lemur and other exotic animals. 
There were tons of attractions here, including a wooden restaurant, a theatre, a sports hall, and beers brewed on-site. In 1889, an American balloonist performed a demonstration in the park by sailing 1,500 metres skyward in a balloon and then jumping to the ground in a parachute he made himself. Surprisingly, that wasn’t the only balloon demonstration: in 1890 a woman took off in a balloon from Helenów Park and made it all the way to Stoki, and two years later, another balloonist rose and jumped using his own parachute. Surprisingly, all three daredevils lived. 
But, as was so often the case in late 19th-century-Łódź, all of this park fun was reserved for the rich. When the park opened, they charged a prohibitively expensive entrance fee that meant the only people visiting the park were the city’s elite. 
That changed after the park’s decline; it was largely devastated in WWI and in WWII it was the site of a lot of military activity. After the war, it was cleaned and reopened to the public for free – but none of the original attractions lasted and the greenery was mostly destroyed. 
Luckily, the city undertook a concerted effort in the 1990s to revitalize and modernize the park, bringing a playground, as well as ponds, alleys and flowerbeds. The park’s popularity grew more when the Marek Edelmen Dialogue Center (p.??) started hosting the “Swining Helenów” festival in 2014. Further efforts have been made to beautify the park over the years, and now it really is one of the best green spaces in the city.
And, unlike its heyday, now it’s free.