Szablyár Péter: Sky-high - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2007)

Some special Towers

No muezzin calls the faithful here The minaret in the Budapest Zoo and Botanical Gardens

Nos. 6—12 Állatkerti körút, District XIV

An edifice of city-wide architectural significance in the Zoo constructed in 1912 was Kornél Neuschloss-Knüsli's House of Pachyderms, a building popularly known as the Elephant House.

An interesting feature of the Oriental-looking building topped with smaller and larger domes was its minaret, pulled down after three short years of its glorious existence in 1915. By the early 1990s the complete reconstruction of the building had become urgent, as the warm and humid air had made the edifice — which was incompetently reconstructed after World War II - a hazard to life and limb.

Designs for the reconstruction of the Elephant House were made (by architects Katalin Kugler and Anthony Gall) on the basis of general plans for the area drawn up in 1995. By 1998 designs for the restoration of the demolished minaret were also completed. In the absence of original documentation, this was done with the

■ Minaret in the Zoo

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