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MAY 2017 - COOPERATION WITH THE DUKE OF EDINBURGH INTERNATIONAL AWARD The work of The Friends of Czech Heritage was cited as an example of how to encourage volunteering in recent publicity by the Duke of Edinburgh Award scheme. It featured current participants in the award programme in the Czech Republic at work on the Jan Hus Church, Smíchov, Prag...
THE FRIENDS' WORKING HOLIDAYS IN 2017 Saturday 3rd to Saturday 10th June 2017. The Seventh Year of Restoration at Červený Dvůr, an estate that was once the summer residence of the Schwarzenberg family and is now a sanatorium. Participants will work on the restoration of an 18th-century gardener’s cottage on the estate and help to recr...
August 2016 - A grant to Skanzen Chanovice Some building types get much more exposure when it comes to saving a nation’s heritage whilst others receive scant attention. Rural agricultural buildings especially belong to this group. They are often very rare because they are undervalued and many were destroyed in the days of rural collectivisation. Th...
July 2016 - A grant to St James's Church, Bedřichův Světec In the rural unsung areas of the Czech Republic small groups are trying to reclaim their local heritage. Like the Zámek at Čečovice and St Nicholas's Church at Petrovice, which we reported on in our last Newsletter, the local action group is restoring the church for community use. Although ...
July 2016 - A grant to the Probošt House, Vyšehrad, Prague Close to the Church of Saints Peter and Paul and the National Cemetery, the Probošt House, now occupied by a kindergarten, has within it some fine early-18th-century frescoes. These are ‘listed’ and have been conserved. The windows, replaced in the 1980s, were sub-standard and are now in ve...
July 2016 - A grant towards the adaptation of the Hussite Church in Prague Smíchov The Czechoslovak Hussite Church as an institution was founded on 25th July 1920 and gave Prague several significant and interesting buildings, mostly in the Modernist architectural style. Amongst these is the property of the Jan Hus Congregation in Smíchov, whose out...
June 2016 - WORKING HOLIDAY The Friends' working holiday at Žďár nad Sázavou included maintenance of the Lower Cemetery (which was in fact never used for burials) and ran 11th-18th June. The site was built by the famous Baroque architect J. B. Santini-Aichel, and the work means that it can now be opened to the public. Tasks involved simple bu...
December 2015 - Work is currently progressing on the bay window roofs and attic floor of the Gardener's Cottage, the Mauricovna, at Červený Dvůr in South Bohemia. The Friends have held working holidays here each year since 2011. The cottage is an important feature in the landscape garden. It was a ruin, but with the help of UK volunteers it is bein...
November 2015 - Celebrations at the Church of St. Nicholas in Petrovice, Úst í nad Labem, North Bohemia On Saturday 14.11.2015 Petrovice celebrated an event that the community had been waiting for, for decades. Twenty-seven years ago, after an inadequate repair, the roof of the building collapsed and the church was facing oblivion. The authorities ...
August 2015 - The Château of Čečovice boasts a new ceiling In time for the summer festival in Čečovice, and ahead of schedule, visitors to the château will be able to see the progress in the restoration of the building destroyed by neglect and a devastating fire. The best remaining room of the château now has a ceiling thanks to a grant from T...
