Painters and plasterers

Many of the historical buildings in Lviv are testimonies to the status of their builders or owners. For this reason, from the Renaissance to more recent times, special attention was given to the design of their representative parts, such as their facades, entrance halls and stairwells. These, especially the interior spaces, were frequently ornamented with decorative stucco and murals.

Unfortunately, most of these ornamentations were uncared for or disfigured during the soviet period.  Stuccowork was hacked away for plumbing and conduits, and murals were cut away, or plastered or painted over.  That is why these original features of almost every house in the historical inner city are hidden under layers of paint or improvised repairs.

Historical stuccowork is fragile and its function is mostly aesthetic. Therefore owners treat it carelessly, and consider its restoration to be of marginal importance, without fully appreciating its value as an essential element of the design of the building.

Murals are similarly importance elements of a historical building’s aesthetic system, but they too are delicate, and where they have not been covered over, they are liable to flaking and their colours and details can fade if they are not treated correctly.

In order to promote and strengthen the skills needed to restore and preserve these historical features, the project organized training courses for local plasterers and painters during which the following were restored:

• stuccowork and mural fragments in the porte-cochere of Lviv’s School No. 21 at No. 8, Konyskogo Stree;
• stuccowork of the staircase at No. 12 Teatralna Street.