Every design for Dzierżoniów

From the Punkt widokowy na wieży Ratusza, the lookout in the town hall tower, Dzierżoniów lies spread out across its basin at the foot of the Owl Mountains, with the Ślęża massif rising to the north. The Piława river runs through town, and its current gave the place its old German name, Reichenbach – the rich, strong stream. The Polish name came later and honours Jan Dzierżon, the priest and scientist who studied bees.

The Figura św. Jana Nepomucena has stood on the market square since the eighteenth century, among elegant tenements and a town hall that was thoroughly rebuilt in the nineteenth. Around it, the Old Town fills with fairs and annual events. For centuries this was a trading town for textiles and linen, and today the Sowiogórskie Muzeum Techniki and the Młyn Hilberta add their own chapters to a story that also includes diplomats meeting here to settle European wars.

If you know the walk from the market square out towards the hills, with the mountains turning blue in the evening, you know exactly where this map begins – and why it belongs to you.