Every design for Cieszyn

Cieszyn is known as the town a river divided. The Olza forms the border with the Czech Republic here, and across three bridges lies Český Těšín, once the western suburbs of the same town. Both halves belong to Cieszyn Silesia, the historical region whose capital this has always been, and since border controls disappeared, people simply walk from one side to the other.

The old town has a gentle Old-Austrian air – after fires and rebuilding it earned the nickname Little Vienna – and the layers are easy to feel: Piast dukes, Habsburg rulers, and the peace treaty that Maria Theresa and Frederick II signed in the town. On Góra Zamkowa, Wieża Piastowska and an eleventh-century Romanesque chapel are all that remain of the castle. Down in town, Studnia Trzech Braci marks the legend of Bolko, Leszko and Cieszko, three brothers who found a spring here and were so glad that they named the place after it: cieszym się, ‘we're happy’. Kościół Jezusowy and the Muzeum Śląska Cieszyńskiego fill in the rest of the story.

Whichever bank of the Olza you grew up on, coming back to the well of the three brothers feels like being welcomed home.