Every design for Chorzów

Under the dome of the Planetarium Śląskie, on one of the highest hills in town, the stars come out at any hour of the day – and outside, Chorzów carries on. This is a city of football, steel and Sunday walks, set in the Silesian Highlands on the Rawa River at the centre of the Metropolis GZM. It is best known for the Silesian Stadium, one of the largest and most important in Poland, and for Ruch Chorzów, one of the most accomplished Polish football clubs.

For many people Chorzów feels like a day out that never quite ended: the Kolej parkowa w Parku Śląskim, the screams from the Lech Coaster and the planetarium on its hill. The working town around it has a longer story. From 1797 a settlement grew up around the Royal Coal Mine and Royal Iron Works, called Królewska Huta by Poles and Königshütte by Germans; it became a city in 1868 and merged with its neighbours between 1934 and 1939 under the oldest name, Chorzów. The Muzeum Hutnictwa w Chorzowie keeps that iron-making past.

The detail to remember is Szyb Prezydent, an old mine shaft that still stands over the city it helped to build.