06-23-16 Another Day in Prague

The Estates Theatre was built during the late 18th century in response to the Enlightenment thought regarding general access to the theatre, and theatres themselves demonstrating the cultural standards of a nation. The Estates Theatre was designed and built a little less than two years for the aristocrat Count Nostitz Rieneck. Currently productions include a variety of productions – drama, opera, music, plays – and the schedule changes virtually every day requiring the stage to be reset daily. Our visit included a nice tour of the building, a visit to several boxes and a performance by several musicians.

Estates Theatre outside
Estates Theatre Building
Estates theatre us in seat
A quick picture of us while sitting in the main floor.
estate theatre view from box of boxes jpl 1
Janeen claiming her box for the evening.
Estates Theatre boxes
The boxes were nicely directed and pleasant.
Estates theatre building stage
The Stage crew has permanent employment as the change is reset every day.

After the tour of the Theatre, we went to the Municipal House. This is a civic building originally built in the 1380’s but destroyed but ultimately rebuilt in 1905. It was finally opened in 1912 and has a large auditorium and a number of “waiting” rooms around the outside of the main auditorium. It is notable for having a good deal of art installations done by Alfons Mucha, Jan Preisler and others. Today it is used as a concert hall, ballroom, civic building and I was temped to get tickets to see Diane Reeves who was scheduled for Friday evening.

Municipal house from outside
Municipal Building
Municipal house main hall from balcony dl
Main Auditorium

 

Ladies waiting room b
Mayor’s Waiting Room – with Alfons Mucha artwork depicting some of Czech history.
Ladies Waiting Room a
One of the Lady’s waiting rooms.
Municipal House Mucha glass
Alfonso Mucha stain glass window in the building.

Lunch at the Municipal Building wasn’t anything to write about but at least it was filling and in an interesting environment.

From there we went shopping as Janeen had found an artist’s work in the gift shop she liked so we had to track down where we could see other examples. This ended up as trip to a nice shop at which we purchased a lovely necklace (more on that tomorrow).  This involved going to two of the three shops but again more on that tomorrow.

We did stop in Old Town Square for a nice bottle of wine.  It was SO hot, the water truck showed up to wet down the plaza and people as desired.

Old Town Square water truck 3

Heading back to our hotel took pictures of a couple of interesting buildings.

waling tour cubist bldg 1
This is called the ‘cubist’ building as it represented that style when it was built.
waling tour cubist bldg 2
Hard to see but there is a Black Madonna on the corner of the cubist building.

waling tour interesting bldg

That evening we connected with Jerry and Gloria and took another Uber to dinner at Divine Cafe and Wine Bar.  Sitting in the patio we enjoyed a lovely dinner of the special of the day.

Divine Dinner wine
Of course there was wine – 2 bottles of nice local Rose
Divine Dinner salad
We all shared a salad – goat cheese and rocket.
Divine Dinner Ravilloi
Open Ravioli with Lamp – pea, radishes and local farm yoghurt.
Divine Dinner Pork belly
Local Farm Pork Neck – carrot, onion, ash-roasted potatoes, smoked pork belly and mustard demi-glace
Divine Dinner dessert 1
Yoghurt Panna Cotta – cherries, chocolate, rosemary and meringue.

The following day Jerry and Gloria were to fly home so this was to be our final meal on this trip with them and it certainly was enjoyable.  A cab ride back to the hotel and the day was finished.