Meskó Csaba: Thermal Baths - Our Budapest (Budapest, 1999)

Glass mosaics inside the dome of Széchenyi

former professor of the Technical University had died in 1903). Czigler had appointed the architect Ede Dvorzsák, also professor of the Technical University, to be his successor. Out of respect for Czigler’s testament, it was Dvorzsák in conjunction with Kálmán Gerster whom the authorities commissioned with supervising the construction of the baths. The Széchenyi Medicinal Baths was opened on 16 June 1913 by the municipal authorities of Budapest. The lido opened its gates in August 1927. Completed in 1938, the baths’ Well No. II, also known as St Stephen Spring, brought 6,000 cubic metres of thermal water at 77°C to the surface from a depth of 1,256 metres.

The medicinal bath is within the Czigler wing of the baths complex, whose bathing departments can be accessed from the main entrance, which faces the City Park. The Eclectic building is a fine ornament of the City Park. Its external sculptural decoration is the work of Ede Teles and Géza Maróti. Through the south-facing main entrance we arrive in the foyer and then on into the huge, neo- Baroque vaulted hall. This magnificently ornamented hall is the hub of the main building. The dome vaulting is decorated with glass mosaics down to the level of the main cornice. The mosaic, topped by the foursome of the Sun God, features allegorical figures of the twelve months. Between the window spaces are allegories of Egyptian, Greek, Roman, and Oriental bathing, the wall surfaces be35