Lanckorona is a place forgotten by time. On spring and summer weekends, tourists who come here for walks, for ceramics and for coffee in cafes hidden in old villas and houses covered with shingles, remember us. Sometimes we give a wave to signal that we invite you to stop by. In the winter, we organize "Interpersonal carols", there is the Easter Market and the St. John's Market, and before Christmas, our small town angels celebrate the holidays. We don't know why, but this is where they settled for good. They say they choose quiet places with good energy. This is what it is like with us.
Good, creative and artistic spirits live on the hill of Lanckorona. They occupy old houses, saved from oblivion and collapse. That's how it was with us. First, we found a large wooden house with a beautiful stone cellar. It looked like a Tuscan dream. In this Małopolska Tuscany, we have created our own Artistic Ceramics Gallery, and the space, facade, garden and surroundings began to be filled with glazed unicorns, chanterelles, birds on wires and those on branches, ceramic trophies, geckos climbing on the walls, angels and quite practical dishes. A house was built above the gallery. Surrounded by a green curtain of creepers, with a magical garden and a wooden interior. We have an artistic space for you here with an open living room, kitchen and dining room, a beautiful bathroom with a bathtub and a floor with two bedrooms. We can host 7 people in total. However, watch out for stowaways, birds, trees, horses are sneaking in from the gallery below, but they live here without disturbing anyone.
When the house and gallery were taken care of, we took care of Arka. It is one of the oldest houses in Lanckorona, which survived the fire of the village in the 19th century. Here, under a shingle roof, we have created the Arka Cafe, where you can feel at home. Come for coffee, home-made cake, dumplings, delicious tea with cloves. During hot summer days, you can hide in the shade of grapevines in a quiet garden, sip lemonade, eat cheesecake or raspberry cotton candy and think that life can't get any better than this.
We feel a pang of jealousy that we are letting our house go, but in the end, everyone deserves beautiful memories. We have ours, you will just create them. We invite you to Domek nad Galerią (House above the Gallery).
Above our original Artistic Ceramics Gallery, in a beautiful wooden house, which in summer takes on a green robe of creepers, in autumn all blushes, and in winter shows its true face - old logs.
We invite you backstage, to an extraordinary house that lives with art. At the bottom there are our ceramic creatures, vessels, sculptures, raindrops and glazed busts, at the top you - the discoverers of the small-town Lanckorona.
Through a beautiful porch, wooden doors you will get to the lower floor of the cottage. There is a living area - a large dining room with a wooden table for 10 people and a kitchen. You can cook home-made here. There is a four-burner hob, fridge, pots, pans, an overflow coffee maker, glasses and cutlery. The dining room and kitchen take up half of the house.
In the second part, in the open space, there is a lounge with miles of sofas and a bathroom with a bathtub. Everything has its own unique wooden atmosphere, here and there you will find our ceramics, works of our friends and accessories that we have collected over the years and have found their place here.
Up the stairs and there are bedrooms, two to be exact. One four-person room with a double bed and two single beds, and two three-person rooms - a double bed and a single bed.
Outside, in the magic garden, you will feel that the world does not exist around you. You can drink coffee under the sun-shielding beech trees, discover what is hidden behind the stone cellar, and spend wonderful evenings or even nights in a hidden barn.
In the green space of the garden, a large table and a grill await you.
We don't have televisions or internet here. Somehow, nobody needs them there, nobody misses them.
Make yourself at home and cook hard, or do not look into the pots at all. At your disposal is a fully equipped home kitchen. There is also a large table in the dining room for 10 people and a large table in the garden - there you can also serve dishes. In the garden surrounded by greenery, there is also a barbecue and a barn for relaxing.
If you do not like cooking, we invite you to our Arka Cafe, 10 meters from the cottage. Come for breakfasts with delicious Italian coffee, for afternoon tea with home-made cake, and for dinner for soup and pampered dumplings stuffed with various types of stuffing. Also try the beer from Szczyrzycki Browar Cystersów.
For bread, go to Piekarnia Siwek. Delicious bread, bread with a crispy crust, unique Lanckorona buns, pretzels and well-stuffed donuts.
Lanckorona is a great example of the fact that the passing time sometimes avoids cities and towns. It is so small that you do not need to create extensive sightseeing plans, prepare addresses worth seeing, but it has so much charm and points that are worth checking in that it is enough for a few days of walking. The whole town looks a bit like a live open-air museum. Here is an old whitewashed cottage, there are ruins of a 14th century castle, a villa around the corner, where Józef Piłsudski, Józef Beck, Ignacy Mościcki, and later Karol Wojtyła stayed.
Take your first steps to the Museum Chamber, at the very market square. The exhibition itself is modest, but interesting, and it authentically presents the history of Lanckorona, archaeological excavations from the castle area, items evoking the everyday life of the inhabitants and, most importantly, a model of the market square before the fire in the 19th century. It is here in the Chamber that you will meet true enthusiasts who know all the Lanckorona secrets, stories, courtyards and all the surrounding cats. They will be happy to show you paths to interesting places. It is also worth taking advantage of the tours organized by guides, such as "Everyday life of old Lanckoronians", "Secrets of the former Lanckorona buildings".
With or without a guide, it is worth climbing Lanckorońska Mountain (550 m above sea level) towering over the city. On its top, there are the ruins of a 14th-century castle, one of many built at the behest of Casimir the Great. On its slopes, there are two viewpoints, from which, when the visibility is good, looking south, you can even see the panorama of the Tatra Mountains, Diablak, or Babia Góra, and when looking north, you can see the Kościuszko Mound in Kraków. The alleys and paths around the Lanckorońska Mountain are 10 km long, lead through various terrain and have charming names dating back to the 1920s, such as Aleja Zakochanych or Aleja Silent Whispers.
It is more than certain that you will find a village square with wooden buildings. Unique and the only one of its kind in Poland. Here you will discover angels, beautiful ceramics, cafes and be amazed that people can live so peacefully, in such a timelessness.
Three steps from the House in our Arka Cafe you can not only drink delicious coffee with cinnamon and ginger or good loose tea. Throughout the year, we organize vernissages, concerts, wine tastings, dancing parties, and in January, the annual "Interpersonal Christmas carols" takes place. Just below you, on the floor below, there is the author's Gallery of Artistic Ceramics. This is where you can buy decorative and functional works of mine, my wife and our friends - sculptors, painters and ceramists.
Hence, the smell of warm bread will lead you to the Siwek bakery with over 100 years of tradition. Buy some bread and necessarily a Lanckorona bun.
Lanckorona is already old, but it does not rest on its laurels. For several years, events have been organized here: Easter Market, Midsummer Fair and the most interesting Angel Festival in the Town - an event that has been taking place in the village for 10 years.
What’s there for children?
All kids are welcome. Introduce them to the world of art in the Gallery on the ground floor, tell the story of the great fortress rising above the city, show the swimming pool hidden among the trees, discover a wooden car, beautiful old villas with fairy tales, then a coffee break in a cafe, a walk along the Avenue of Lovers, and then observing the snow-capped peaks of the Tatra Mountains with binoculars. In the evening, fairy tales about angels in a barn hidden in the garden, watching the stars and some beautiful, hand-made souvenir. It will be peaceful, family and blissful.