Central Moravian Power Plants Department Store

The “SME Palace of Light”, the first realisation of radical functionalism in Přerov, designed by the famous Brno architect Bohuslav Fuchs, a native of nearby Všechovice, became not only the most prominent business building in the town centre to date but also a great advertisement for the progressive management of the Central Moravian Power Plants (SME), which conceived the building for commercial, administrative, and residential purposes.

The exposed plot of land opposite the railway station was originally intended to contain two new buildings to complete the street frontage – the SME department store in the right-hand third and the Lipner Hotel in the other two thirds. However, Fuchs – in accordance with the approved regulatory plan – proposed that the entire block should be built in the shape of a pointed trapezoid. The opposite front would then be formed by two equally tall residential buildings, while the inner block would be cut through by a large covered urban arcade. Schematically, Fuchs also designed a new mass arrangement of the corners, with a clear centre and a passage into the green space of the courtyard. The roof of the arcade within the block was part of a larger area of ground floor service halls, such as garages. While the SME Palace was completed in 1930, the Lipner Hotel was not, for unknown reasons, built until 1934, according to plans by F. J. Leopold, a “hotel and inn architect” from Prague, which marked a step backwards in terms of architectural style. The rest of Fuchsʼ vision was not realised at all.

The three-storey SME building, with a mezzanine and a roof extension inserted into the courtyard side and complemented by a large terrace, was constructed not with reinforced concrete, but with a less common and more costly steel skeleton lined with hollow bricks. The “in-depth” arrangement of the beams in five rows fits into the rhythm of the street façade divided into four equal parts, which, however, does not look dull thanks to the well-thought-out articulation (reduction) of the mass; at the level of the first to third floors the façade merges with the façade of the neighbouring building, in the mezzanine part, across the entire width of the building, and in the case of the loggias and the underpass originally conceived as a passageway it recedes from the street front. Fuchs treated the surface of the façade partly with exclusive white opaxite but mostly with artificial light plaster. He placed special emphasis on the glazing of this “palace of light”, which is why he used large strip windows set into the face of the façade and generous glass display windows on the ground floor. The courtyard façade, in comparison, looked more robust. The protruding prism of the staircase, illuminated by full-height glass-concrete and flanked by a passenger lift, was cut into its face.

Behind the shop windows on the ground floor was the main shop, including a display of consumer electronics, which was connected by a spiral staircase to the head office on the mezzanine floor. The upper floors housed the companyʼs offices and apartments; the attic was reserved for a studio.

The construction of the “palace”, hitherto unprecedented in the town, was watched with interest by the townsfolk, who commented on it in the local press. Their enthusiasm is typified by an article in the Haná newspaper: “... when thousands of light bulbs and electric fixtures shine their lights into Husova [Street] and electric eyes cast their gaze far and wide over the dark streets of the town, only then will we get a clear idea of the purpose and promotional paths pursued by the SME headquarters... The splendid paint scheme, the huge bands of window glass, and in general the modern style of the large, unobstructed, unencumbered spaces... We take an electric lift through the mezzanine and first, second, and third floors and find ourselves on the fifth floor, which only extends into the courtyard, while opposite the railway it has a spacious terrace that could just as easily serve as a natural ballet hall as an ornamental hanging garden... Přerov will be able to boast a blazing new jewel to foreigners.”

The basic layout of the building remains unchanged to this day; however, many of the details that determined its original appearance are missing (removal of the opaxite panelling, replacement of the windows with plastic ones, the passageway being made less accessible, etc.). In 2011, the façade was repaired, including insulation, which largely obscured its original flatness that was characteristic of functionalism. The reconstruction was therefore not carried out in the optimal way in terms of the monument protection of the building and its significance in the history of modern Czech architecture. However, some merits still remain: the reuse of the ground floor, the colour and character of the chosen plaster, and the restoration of the original - blue – colour where the exposed structures still allowed it.

AW (translation by SG)

Selected literature

Martina Mertová, Proměny Přerova mezi dvěma světovými válkami aneb Jak si vedli domácí a jak hosté v napínavém architektonickém zápasu, in: Jan Janák – Jan Jeništa – Klára Jeništová et al., Kapitoly z výtvarné kultury města Přerova:  Architektura, výtvarné realizace, design, Přerov 2016, pp. 8–23.

Iloš Chronek, Architekt Bohuslav Fuchs, Brno 1995.

Pavel Zatloukal, K přerovské moderní architektuře, Kultura Přerova, 1980, p. 182.

Zdeněk Kudělka, Bohuslav Fuchs, Brno 1966, p. 126.

-lský-, Deset minut ve světelném paláci SME v Přerově, Haná 1930, č. 152, 5.7.

Obchodní dům Středomoravských elektráren (SME) v Přerově. B. Fuchs, Stavitel 14, 1933–1934, č. 8–9, pp. 114–115.