Diary of the last reconstruction 2012 – 2018
The monument, devastated during the Polish People’s Republic, required major renovation. This task was undertaken by Piotr’s daughter, Agnieszka Komierowska-Ziomek. The renovation took 6 full years and involved not only renovation work, but also extensive bureaucracy and complex design work that was still evolving. I invite you to immerse yourself in this extremely interesting story frame by frame and take a closer look at
what I faced while rebuilding our wonderful ancestral palace.
Agnieszka Komierowska-Ziomek
President of the Management Board of Pałac Komierowo Komfit Sp. z o. o
Beginnings
My first meeting with our ancestral palace
in Komierowo had none of the charm of old legends
and fairy tales. I saw… a ruined building, surrounded by a neglected park. It was difficult to find even a trace of its former beauty in it. Instead of a neo-baroque-classicist building, we saw a dying empty building before our eyes. The sight was heartbreaking. We started the construction works by removing all plasters, demolishing unnecessary walls, dismantling the historic balustrade, cleaning and protecting the roof against rainfall.
An endless mess
The cleanup took several months. Then I thought: “how much work there is still here!” But I didn’t say it out loud. Everyone around me was saying it, so I didn’t want to show that something was beyond me. Instead, I simply kept an eye on the schedule to move from stage to stage as smoothly as possible.
Demolition of the existing roof truss
Renovation works in the palace began in 2013. Over the course of 5 years, about 600 people participated in the construction, and about 30 worked there every day. We added a conference room and a delivery area to the palace (a huge one-story building with utility rooms). We also built a new boiler room and we added an underground connector, which in the future would connect the palace with the new hotel part.
Coordination on the construction site, removal of old walls and reshaping of rooms
I was very tired, but at the same time fulfilled. We worked every day from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. I decided to devote myself entirely to this task and treated every completed detail as a personal success. Of course, there were also many failures. The most difficult thing, however, was the multi-thread nature of this huge renovation. I had to coordinate many areas at the same time, including official work, permits, expert opinions, projects, and contacts with contractors, purchases and settlements. We made all connections – sanitary sewage, rainwater and water drainage. We have installed dozens of kilometers of concealed installations (electrical, telecommunications and sanitary). We also built
120 meters of pre-insulated pipes to power the palace and the outbuilding in heat and utility or chilled water used for air conditioning. Simultaneously with the work in the palace, we started working on restoring the splendor of the park surrounding it. There were over 2,000 trees in it.
We started with an inventory describing their size, species and location on the map.
Storm 200 km/h
In 2017, a hurricane with a force of 200 km/h passed through the park, in which we lost over 700 specimens.
For the next three years, we struggled with the effects of this devastating event. Then the Volunteer Fire Department from all over Poland helped us a lot. One of the firefighters, when he found out that I was Komierowska, was very shocked. After work he came up to me and said,
that he imagined me as such a dignified lady sitting in an armchair and petting a large, skinny… cat. I laughed until I cried. I totally didn’t fit this characterization. He saw me in wellingtons and work clothes, determining the size of the aggregate fraction for paving parking lots with the pavers. And why a cat?!
Grand opening
After many years of hard work full of dedication and passion, the Palace in Komierowo has once again become the pearl of Krajna. We provide our guests with 16 elegant rooms and a park with an area of 16 hectares, sports facilities and a restaurant serving exclusively prepared dishes from fresh, natural products from local suppliers.
Agnieszka and Piotr Komierowscy
At this point I would like to emphasize that the entire renovation was financed by my father – Piotr Komierowski, from private funds. The state did not contribute a single penny. All 6 applications for funding were rejected, informally justifying it with a private investment. We had to buy the monument itself from the State Treasury after it was stolen from us
and completely destroyed.
Agnieszka and Piotr Komierowscy