Łódź Voivodeship (1919–1939)

Łódź, also seen without diacritics as Lodz, is a city in central Poland and a former industrial centre. It is the capital of Łódź Voivodeship, and is located approximately 120 km (75 mi) south-west of Warsaw. The city's coat of arms is an example of canting, as it depicts a boat (łódź in Polish), which alludes to the city's name. As of 2022, Łódź has a population of 670,642 making it the country's fourth largest city. Łódź was once a small settlement that first appeared in 14th-century records. It was granted town rights in 1423 by Polish King Władysław II Jagiełło and it remained a private town of the Kuyavian bishops and clergy until the late 18th century. In the Second Partition of Poland in 1793, Łódź was annexed to Prussia before becoming part of the Napoleonic Duchy of Warsaw; the city joined Congress Poland, a Russian client state, at the 1815 Congress of Vienna. The Second Industrial Revolution (from 1870) brought rapid growth in textile manufacturing and in population owing to the inflow of migrants, notably Germans and Jews. Ever since the industrialization of the area, the city has been multinational and struggled with social inequalities, as documented in the novel The Promised Land by Nobel Prize–winning author Władysław Reymont. The contrasts greatly reflected on the architecture of the city, where luxurious mansions coexisted with red-brick factories and dilapidated tenement houses.The industrial development and demographic surge made Łódź one of the largest cities in Poland. Under the German occupation during World War II Łódź was briefly renamed Litzmannstadt after Karl Litzmann. The city's population was persecuted and its large Jewish minority was forced into a walled zone known as the Łódź Ghetto, from where they were sent to German concentration and extermination camps. The city became Poland's temporary seat of power in 1945. Łódź experienced a sharp demographic and economic decline after 1989. It was only in the 2010s that the city began to experience revitalization of its neglected downtown area. Łódź is ranked by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network on the "Sufficiency" level of global influence and is internationally known for its National Film School, a cradle for the most renowned Polish actors and directors, including Andrzej Wajda and Roman Polanski. In 2017, the city was inducted into the UNESCO Creative Cities Network and named UNESCO City of Film.

The Battle of Łódź took place from 11 November to 6 December 1914, near the city of Łódź in Poland. It was fought between the German Ninth Army and the Russian First, Second, and Fifth Armies, in harsh winter conditions. The Germans redeployed their Ninth Army around Thorn, so as to threaten the Russian northern flank, following German reversals after the Battle of the Vistula River. The German objective was to prevent an invasion of Germany, and thus considered a success, though narrowly avoiding disaster.

Plac Wolności, known in English as Liberty Square, is an octagonal public square located in central Łódź, Poland. Completed in 1823, it is the northern endpoint of the commercial Piotrkowska Street. Its present name commemorates Poland regaining its independence in 1918.

The Great Synagogue of Łódź (Polish: Wielka Synagoga w Łodzi) was a synagogue in Łódź, Poland, which was built in 1881. It was designed by Adolf Wolff and paid mostly by local industrialists, such as Izrael Poznański, Joachim Silberstein and Karol Scheibler. It served the reformed congregation and was usually referred to as The Temple.Prominent Łódż builder and architect Johann Steck (or, Jan Sztek, 1851–1914) carried out construction of the Great Synagogue in 1881–1887, at the corner of ul. Zielona and al. Tadeusza Kościuszki (formerly ul. Spacerowa). The synagogue was burned to the ground by the Germans on the night of November 14, 1939, along with its Torah scrolls and interior fixtures. It was dismantled in 1940. Today the site is used as a parking lot.

The Medical University of Łódź was founded on October 1, 2002 as a merger of the Medical Academy of Łódź (founded January 1, 1950) and the Military Medical Academy of Łódź (founded July 1, 1958). It is the largest teaching hospital unit in Poland and a European research center.

Ezras Izrael Synagogue, also known as the Wołyńska Shul, was a synagogue in Łódź, Poland located at ul. Wólczańska 6 Street. It was built in 1899-1904 from donations by the Jewish merchants including those expelled from Tsarist Lithuania and Belarus area. The architect was Gustaw Landau-Gutenteger. The synagogue flourished for only three decades. It was burned to the ground by the Nazis on November 11, 1939 before the Łódź Ghetto was set up.

Hotel Polonia Palst is a hotel in Łódź, Poland.

Arlekin Puppet Theatre, officially named Henryk Ryl Arlekin Puppet Theatre in Łódź, is a puppet theatre in Łódź, Poland.

The Stara Synagogue, also known as Alte Szil and ‘’’Alt Stodt Shul’’’ meaning Old Town Synagogue was a "beautiful" synagogue in Łódź, Poland. The name Stara means old, many Polish cities called the oldest synagogue in town the Stara synagogue. The Stara was Łódź's principal Orthodox synagogue. It was built by Orthodox industrial magnates who wished to outshine, or at least compete with, the 1881 Great Synagogue (Łódź) built by the Reformed Jewish community.

The Izrael Poznański Palace (Polish: Pałac Izraela Poznańskiego) is a 19th-century palace in Łódź, Poland. Initially the site of a tenement building, the property was transformed into a Neo-Renaissance and Neo-baroque style residence during the years 1888 to 1903.

The Alexander Nevsky Cathedral (Polish: Sobór św. Aleksandra Newskiego w Łodzi; Russian: Александро-Невский собор) is a Christian Orthodox church located in the city of Łódź, in central Poland. It was built in the late 19th century as a gift from the local industrialists to the small Orthodox community present in Łódź at the time. The church consists of many ornate elevations and has a richly decorated interior featuring an iconostasis manufactured in St. Petersburg.

The Grazyna and Kiejstut Bacewicz University of Music in Łódź (Polish: Akademia Muzyczna im. Grażyny i Kiejstuta Bacewiczów w Łodzi), is a government-funded Institution of higher education in the city of Łódź, Poland. It was created at the turn of the 20th century as the Helena Kijeńska-Dobkiewicz Music Conservatory. After World War II, the Academy was reactivated as the State Conservatory of Music (April 18, 1945). It was re-structured as the Music Academy by the Act of Polish Parliament in 1982. Since 1999 it is named after one of its Rectors, as the Grażyna and Kiejstut Bacewicz University of Music.Among the former rectors of the Academy who influenced the Polish music scene were Kazimierz Wiłkomirski (1945-1947), cellist, composer, conductor and brother of Wanda Wiłkomirska, as well as Kazimierz Sikorski (1947-1954), recipient of the Order of Polonia Restituta (1937), composer of symphonies, overtures and concertos.The rectorate is housed in the Karol Poznański Palace on ul. Gdańska.