Kyselka will offer guided tours for the first time this weekend

photo: Lukáš Podhorský

Kyselka (Karlovy Vary) - Visitors to the former spa Kyselka will be able to glimpse the once grand and now devastated monuments on guided tours for the first time. The tours will be organized by the non-profit organization Lázně Kyselka, which is striving to restore the heritage-protected ensemble of buildings. The first tours will take place this Saturday, as reported by Miroslav Perout, the director of the non-profit organization, to the Czech Press Agency today.
    "We have decided to support our efforts for rescue with guided tours, through which we want to draw attention to the importance of saving this unique cultural heritage and gaining supporters for it. The guests will be guided by Heinrich Mattoni, the man who made the spa famous at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries," Perout stated.
    The first tours will take place on Saturday at 1:30 PM and 3:00 PM. For further dates, prior reservations are required via email at prohlídky@laznekyselka.org. During the fifty-minute excursion, visitors will walk through part of the area with Mattoni's villa, the building of the former restaurant, taste the Ott's spring, and ascend along the artificial waterfall to the pavilion where it springs. "They will see the ruins of splendid buildings constructed during the golden age of the spa and, after decades of decay and devastation, will personally witness the story of a new hope for Kyselka," Perout stated.
    The non-profit organization Lázně Kyselka was established last year by an agreement between the municipality, property owners, and the city of Karlovy Vary. The Karlovy Vary Mineral Waters joined the non-profit organization, transferring the necessary land for construction work and 20 million crowns to it. The company RIS, which owned most of the buildings in the dilapidated spa, also transferred the buildings to the organization. The management of the non-profit organization is headed by Vladimír Lažanský, who has experience in the restoration of monuments, and also by the great-grandson of the founder, Rudolf Mattoni.
    The non-profit organization Lázně Kyselka first seeks to save the buildings that are at risk of irreversible destruction and gradually find uses for the most valuable objects.