For many building developers, the clearance of Brno’s city centre in the late 19th century was a great business opportunity. Antonín Müller, for instance, acquired an entire block of old buildings on the corner of today’s Česká and Solniční Streets and in their place built a complex of three apartment buildings with a hotel. Architect Antonín Blažek’s symmetrical ensemble of Art Nouveau buildings with rounded corners is accentuated by a raised turret done in the style of a loggia on the corner overlooking Opletalova Street, where an overhanging cornice clad in sheet metal is mirrored in the shape of the wrought-iron balcony railings with vegetal decoration on the first and second floors. Vegetal ornamentation was also used on the pilasters decorating both corner towers, whose peaks Pavel Zatloukal has described as evoking the triumphal motif of a royal crown.
The lateral wings were smoothly plastered, the chambranles decorated with floral or geometric elements and the top-most floor strongly accentuated by rich floral stuccowork on the apron walls, while the areas between the windows were decorated with geometric shapes and undulating reliefs. The ground floor and first floor were clad with stucco bossage, and contemporary photographs published in the Austrian journal Der Architekt also show metal-framed ground-floor shop windows on the building at Solniční 11. This building’s current appearance dates from 1920–1921, when it was renovated in the Art Deco style according to plans by Jaroslav Stockar-Bernkopf. Originally, however, this building and the Hotel Slavia formed a symmetrical, almost identical pair of rounded corners inspired by the work of Otto Wagner in Vienna, particularly his apartment building at Linke Wienzeile 38.
The middle building at Solniční 13 follows on the original design of the corner buildings, though it differs in the decoration of the stucco pilasters on the upper floors and the more elaborate decoration between the windows. The main entrance has retained the original door from Blažek’s design. Some of its interiors were modified in 1904 by the architect Dušan Jurkovič to create an exhibition space for the Club of Friends of Art. In the past, the building also housed the consulate of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, which had its own wine bar.
The Art Nouveau hotel was an extension of the original 1893 Neo-Renaissance building on the corner of Solniční and Besední Streets (previously U Solince and U Kasárny), which also housed the Café Slavia. Since 1899, the café and the 43-room hotel had been run by Karel Moravec Sr. (1853–1933), and the 1905 expansion into Müller’s new neighbouring building with a restaurant added another 52 hotel rooms and two apartments for the owner’s family. The hotel and especially its café soon became the centre of Czech social life. Moravec was an ardent patriot and seemingly one of the few Czech hotel owners in Brno. In 1900, the city had 37 registered cafés, only two of which were Czech; the rest were run by Germans. The hotel’s proximity to the Czech Besední dům added to its preeminent social position, and the Slavia hosted various events such as the 1907 Congress of the Association of Czech Chess Players, the founding of the Czech Rowing Club in Brno in 1912 and the founding of the Lawn-Tennis Circle. The hotel was modern for its time, equipped with central heating, bathrooms on each floor and its own cold storage room for the restaurant. Hotel services included ladies’ and men’s hairdressing salons, a laundry, workshops and a garage.
The successful hotelier went on to become chairman of the Moravian Union of Innkeepers and Cafékeepers, sat on the board of directors of the First Brno Brewery and Malt House and also owned shares in several other companies. In 1921, his first-born son Karel Moravec Jr. took over management of the hotel and his father’s other business activities. Successfully continuing his father’s work, he modernized the café, which during the First Republic became a meeting place for important organizations and was visited in the evenings by members of the city’s theatre and music society, whom the owner liked to host. The hotel became the headquarters of a number of associations, including the Anglo-American Club, the French Alliance, the Italian Circle, the Skiing Club, the Rotary Club and the Independent Association of Czechoslovak Legionnaires. The Literary Group met here as well, members of which went on to edit Host magazine. Important figures from cultural and political life who frequented the café include Adolf Stránský, Jan Antonín Baťa, Leoš Janáček, Jiří Mahen and Jan Kubelík, among others.
In 1940 the hotel was confiscated by the Nazis and renamed Germania. Karel Moravec Jr. was deported to the Mauthausen concentration camp and later to Dachau, where he was liberated by the American army in a wretched state. Upon his return to Brno, he found that the hotel had been looted. After gradually renovating it according to plans by Albín Hofírek, he reopened the hotel, only to have the communists nationalize it after their rise to power in 1948. Moravec was forced to leave the hotel and to earn a living doing manual labour. Until 1989 the hotel was managed by the state-run Restaurants and Canteens Enterprise. A major modernization in 1985 left the hotel in debt, and when it was returned to the original owners’ heirs after the Velvet Revolution, they inherited this debt. The hotel building is currently undergoing a complete renovation.
Lucie Valdhansová