Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego was established in 1924 on the initiative of Prime Minister and Treasury Minister Władysław Grabski. From the late 1920s it became the largest bank of the Second Republic. BGK was a long-term credit institution, and its main customers were state institutions and enterprises and local governments. The Bank's special mission was to support the economic development of the state and the implementation of government social and economic programmes. The Bank financed or co-financed many state investments, especially construction projects, as well as the most important strategic undertakings for the country's defence. Since 1931, the Bank's head office was located in Warsaw, in the building designed by Rudolf Świerczyński on Jerozolimskie Avenue. BGK branches were located in more than a dozen cities in Poland.

History of the construction of Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego in Vilnius

The decision to build a branch in Vilnius was adopted by the Supervisory Board of Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego in June 1936. At that time, a large plot of land at 16 Mickiewicza Street was purchased jointly with the P.K.O. bank. The design selected through a competition was entrusted to the winners of the first place, Warsaw architects: Stanisław Gałęzowski and Józef Pańkowski. Pańkowski had already designed for BGK before - according to his design, a branch of the Bank was built in the years. 1934-1935 a branch of the Bank was built in Lublin. The design was approved by the Transport and Construction Department of the Provincial Office and accepted by the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and construction began in mid-1937. Construction work was carried out by Witold Giedroyc's Engineering Works Company of Vilnius. The edifice was handed over for use at the end of 1938, and on 11 December a ceremony of consecration and opening of the edifice took place with the participation of the highest state and church authorities.

Architecture and interiors

The building of the Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego was designed on the projection of the letter "L" - with a four-storey front building and offices and a lower wing housing the operating room. The entire building is constructed in reinforced concrete, with the front façade faced with sandstone, the others covered with a noble mineral plaster (terasite). The front building housed the offices on the ground floor, the management offices on the second floor, and the last two floors were occupied by flats for bank officials. The decoration of the operating room was entrusted - as in the neighbouring P.K.O. bank building - to Ludomir Sleńdziński. - Ludomir Sleńdziński. The painting frieze that surrounded three walls of the hall was entitled "Signs of the economic life of Vilnius". The central part featured an allegorical composition entitled "The passage of time", while along the side walls there were symbolic scenes depicting various branches of the national economy (Weaving, Construction, Industry, Carpentry, etc.).

The body of the BGK building is characterised by a light, modernist form with clear references to functionalist architecture. The front elevation's doubled windows in strips were given a vertical counterpoint in the form of a characteristic motif taken from Le Corbusier's work - a staircase risalit supported on pillars, covered by a vertical screen of a curved blind wall and illuminated by strips of side glazing. The massiveness of its surface was softened by the relief "Fortuna" by the Vilnius sculptor Tadeusz Godziszewski.

The architectural form of the building aroused controversy already at the stage of project approval. In response to accusations of inadequate monumentality, the Building Council of the bank replied:

"The elevation on the side of Mickiewicza Street is considered by the Building Council to have been resolved adequately. As far as the objection to the use of the risalite block is concerned, we would like to point out that the bending of the plane (...) and making its thickness visible gives it a great lightness, while the vertical composition with the sculpture above the entrance sufficiently richly and monumentally emphasises the entrance to the Bank. In view of this, it is incomprehensible for us to accuse the design of the entrance of being too modest."

The BGK building was criticised in the circles of Vilnius conservationists, art historians and lovers of old Vilnius. The accusations ranged from a lack of majesty suitable for the headquarters of a serious banking institution to a failure to meet the requirements of a metropolitan location, requiring a representative building here, not a 'factory depot'. Nevertheless, the construction of the modernist headquarters of the Bank Gospodarstwa Krajowego in a prominent position on the main street was a visible sign of the permanent establishment of modern architectural forms in Vilnius.

Historical address: 16 Mickiewicza Street

Contemporary address: Gedimino Prospektas 14