Kiraly Court
Budapest, 6th district, Kiraly utca
Central 6th district (inside/around Nagykorut)
Description
The Király Udvar [Király Court], is located in one of Budapest s prime neighbourhoods, at the corner of Király utca and Székely Mihály utca. As a welcome result of the thoughtful development concept, the flats are organized into three interconnected building blocks. There are 5 to 7 apartments per floor in every building unit, which facilitates good relations among the neighbours. The three blocks of the eight-storey Király Udvar contain a total of 140 flats, whose sizes vary between 32 and 136 square metres; the indoor car park has 160 spaces. The flats include studios, and 1-, 2-, and 3-bedroom units. The building s main entrance is at the corner of Király utca and Székely Mihály utca, where a comfortable lobby awaits visitors. This is where the reception is located, providing security and information, as well as dispatching and monitoring cars. All flats can be reached via the main entrance, but each block also has a separate door on the ground floor. The buildings have spacious elevators that also indicate floor numbers in Braille script.
The three buildings enclose an elliptical inner courtyard: The garden is protected by harmonious, curved walls, and communicates with its environment via passages through the buildings around. The Király Udvar s courtyard has two levels: a hanging garden above, and a recreational park below. At the centre of the hanging garden there is a fountain encircled by a walkway. The tiny creek starting from the fountain descends to the lower garden through a small cascade. The water coming from above ends up in the lower lake surrounded by decorative plants; visitors desiring a relaxing moment can get to the benches over a small bridge across the creek. The building s facade is modest, with historical allusions and simple proportions. The facade s plastered and painted surface is enclosed by a sub-structure, covered in stone, between the ground floor and the first floor, and the main cornice running around the building. The iron rails of the balconies are a subtle allusion to the rail around the corridor in the earlier, classicist building that once stood here, while also structuring the facade.
When the buildings that once stood on the Király Udvar site were demolished years ago due to their deteriorated condition, two 19th century murals were discovered that advertised the shops of Mór Grossmann and Kristóffy & Németh. Since there was no way to remove and conserve the ads painted on the wall, Autóker covered them in the adequate manner, deposited photographs of the paintings at the archives of the Kiscelli Museum (a branch of the Budapest History Museum), and commemorated the one-time shopkeepers by putting up a 2x1-metre oil replica of the ads in the entrance hall of the Király Udvar.