Two parks and the avenue between them
The green belt under the monastery is usually treated as one park, but it is two. South of Henryk Sienkiewicz Avenue lies Stanisław Staszic Park, just under five and a half hectares. North of it is 3 May Park, a hectare larger. Counting the avenue that divides them, the whole layout covers 11.8 hectares.
The ground sits on the eastern slope of the hill, between 260 and 280 metres above sea level, so the walk towards the monastery is a gentle climb you barely notice. Both parks follow the same idea: a wide path runs diagonally across the site, with narrower ones branching off to the pavilions, the pond, playgrounds and benches.
Sienkiewicz Avenue continues the city's main Marian avenue up to the monastery walls and is closed to traffic along its full length; monuments to the priest Jerzy Popiełuszko and to the Unknown Soldier stand beside it. The parks are bounded by 3 Maja, Popiełuszki, Pułaskiego and 7 Kamienic streets.
A city garden reshaped by an exhibition
The land was set aside while the engineer Jan Bernhard was laying out the Marian avenue between 1819 and 1826, merging the old and new towns of Częstochowa into one. The council decided to create a garden here in 1843. Planting began the following year, with some 1,400 trees, and the work was finished in 1847.
The pattern of paths you walk today, however, comes from a later moment. In 1909 Częstochowa hosted the Industry and Agriculture Exhibition, the largest event of its kind in the Russian-ruled Kingdom of Poland. A year earlier Franciszek Szanior, head gardener of Warsaw, redesigned the neglected parks. Most of the mature trees went, only the finest specimens were kept, and pavilions, squares and a new network of paths took their place.
After 1918 several exhibition buildings were pulled down and the parks took the names they still carry. The following decades treated them harshly — the paths were asphalted and the planting ran wild. A thorough restoration ran from 2006 to 2008; the parks reopened on 19 February 2008 with granite, timber and gravel surfaces, two playgrounds, chess tables and fountains in the pond of roughly 1,600 square metres.
What survives from 1909
The exhibition pavilions were designed by leading Warsaw architects of the day, among them Czesław Przybylski and Konstanty Jakimowicz. Four of them still stand in Staszic Park and are looked after by the Częstochowa Museum.
The ethnographic pavilion, Jakimowicz's limestone building, holds collections of folk industry. The peasant homestead was designed by Zdzisław Kalinowski and Czesław Przybylski. The former Hygiene Museum pavilion by Brunon Paprocki housed the regional museum for thirty-five years from 1932 and now takes temporary exhibitions. The fourth building is the old observatory.
There is also a garden pavilion used for summer concerts. The buildings were restored in turn: the homestead between 2003 and 2006, the ethnographic pavilion between 2005 and 2007.
A mine under the footpaths
The biggest surprise here is below ground. The Museum of Iron Ore Mining consists of tunnels cut between 1974 and 1976 between two of the pavilions, recreating the old iron ore workings — ore was mined around Częstochowa for centuries. The machinery and timbering came from the closed Szczekaczka mine. After refurbishment the display reopened on 15 May 2008.
The building put up in 1909 for a joint-stock company from Zawiercie was designed by Władysław Jabłoński. In 1923 it was taken over by Bonawentura Metler, a priest and astronomer, who set up an observatory that began work at the end of the 1920s. Since 5 June 2010 it has housed the Zodiak education centre, which keeps the astronomical thread going.
Sculpture and veteran trees
The parks double as an open-air gallery. In 3 May Park stands the monument to the composer Stanisław Moniuszko by Stefan Policiński, unveiled in 1958 on a granite plinth taken from an earlier monument to Kazimierz Pułaski. Pułaski himself has a bust in Staszic Park made by Jerzy Kędziora in 1994 — the first one, from 1929, was destroyed by the Germans during the occupation.
The Staszic bust dates from 1974 and follows a design by Paweł Maliński of 1826. The figure of a seated girl by Władysław Rudlicki goes back to 1911. The sundial was built from black granite salvaged from the monument to Tsar Alexander II, which stood in front of the monastery from 1889 to 1917. Since 10 August 2008 Staszic Park has held a permanent gallery of Kędziora's balancing sculptures, figures hung on cables that sway in any breeze.
The trees are genuinely old: about 1,300 in Staszic Park, mostly a century or more, and some 1,600 in 3 May Park, many over 130 years. Nine are protected as natural monuments. 3 May Park also contains the courts of the Victoria tennis club, laid out between 1922 and 1926.
Getting there
- On foot — the finest approach runs west along the Marian avenue from the old town, then straight into Sienkiewicz Avenue, which passes between the parks and ends at the monastery walls.
- By train — about two kilometres from Częstochowa station through the city centre, a quarter of an hour on foot.
- By public transport — buses and the tram serve the city centre; the parks themselves are traffic-free and covered on foot.
- By car — from the A1 motorway and the national roads that meet in Częstochowa, follow signs for Jasna Góra; parking is on the streets around the parks, not inside them.
Worth knowing
The parks are open to all and closed overnight, and park regulations apply across the grounds. Crossing them takes a quarter of an hour, but with the pavilions, the mine tunnels and the sculpture it is easy to spend half a day.
The busiest time is August, when walking pilgrimages reach the monastery, and around the Marian feast days. For a quiet visit choose a weekday or an early morning. The museum pavilions set their own admission rules and some close on Mondays, so check the museum's site before you go.
How to get there and practical info
- Location
- Częstochowa, Silesian Voivodeship — between the city centre and the Jasna Góra monastery, on both sides of Sienkiewicz Avenue
- Area
- 11.8 hectares including the avenue: Staszic Park about 5.45 hectares, 3 May Park about 6.39 hectares
- Laid out
- decided by the city in 1843, planted from 1844, completed in 1847
- Present layout
- Franciszek Szanior's 1908 design for the 1909 exhibition, restored in the 2006–2008 works
- Protection
- heritage register together with Jasna Góra — entries of 14 November 1947, 20 December 1972 and 17 February 1978; inside the historic monument declared for the monastery complex in 1994
- Open to visitors
- temporary exhibition pavilion, ethnographic pavilion, peasant homestead, the underground Museum of Iron Ore Mining and the former Zodiak observatory
- Time needed
- a quarter of an hour to walk through, half a day with the pavilions and tunnels
- Current hours and tickets
- the Częstochowa Museum runs the pavilions in Staszic Park and publishes the current visiting rules
When to go
Before the leaves close in, the paths give clear views of the monastery and the pavilion facades. Flowering chestnuts and limes make the walk up the Marian avenue the best possible approach.
The dense old canopy gives shade the city centre lacks, and the fountains run in the pond. It is also the season of concerts in the garden pavilion and of the heaviest pilgrim traffic.
Maples, red oaks and chestnuts colour unusually strongly here, and cooler days are an argument for going down into the mine tunnels.
Bare crowns bring the sculptures and pavilions forward, and the route to the monastery is short and cleared. Visits move indoors at this time of year.
Other sights in Silesian Voivodeship
Straight-line distances from „The parks below Jasna Góra" — calculated from real coordinates. By road it is often further.
Where to stay nearby
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