The best walks and hikes around Łowicz

It was built in the 12th century and is the oldest in the city. The current Baroque church dates back to the 17th century and was consecrated on October 14, 1668. Since September 25, 1433, the parish church has been a collegiate church. On March 25, 1992, by the papal bull Totus Tuus Poloniae Populus, the collegiate church was raised to the dignity of a cathedral. During his 7th pilgrimage to his homeland, visiting Łowicz, Pope John Paul II, on June 14, 1999, gave it the title of minor basilica. The church is located in the city center at the Old Market Square. https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parafia_Wniebowzi%C4%99cia_Naj%C5%9Bwi%C4%99tszej_Maryi_Panny_w_%C5%81owiczu

It is the oldest preserved temple in Łowicz, its construction was mentioned in 1404 as a parish church for the New Town. Gothic building, single-nave, with a narrower presbytery. In 1559, the southern chapel of the shoemakers' guild was added. In 1620, the tower was built. In 1778, the western facade was rebuilt. The facade and the tower in the upper parts are late Baroque. In 1904, the tower was added. The interior furnishings are Baroque and eclectic from the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries.

In the northern part there is the so-called Primate's Gate from the mid-17th century with the Jastrzębiec coat of arms designed by Tomasz Poncino and the former dean's office, currently the seat of the Bishop of Łowicz. The western frontage is built up with a complex of canonries from the 16th-18th centuries with numerous foundation plaques. In the southern part there is a Renaissance tenement house of the Cebrowski family, their distinguished representative was Andrzej Kazimierz Cebrowski, a pharmacist, doctor, author of the first chronicle of the city "Annales Civitatis Loviciae". On the side of the courtyard at ul. Aptekarska there are Renaissance cloisters. For several centuries, the market square served a commercial function - since the Middle Ages, markets were held there - weekly and annual famous fairs. Once in the middle of the market square there was a Gothic, brick town hall, demolished around 1830. The market square is also a place of historical events. On the market square, on 24-25 October 1790, Tadeusz Kościuszko inspected the 9th Crown Infantry Regiment, and on 18 December 1806, Napoleon Bonaparte stopped in one of the tenement houses on his way to Warsaw after his victory at Jena and Auerstadt. There are two monuments on the market square: to the Sons of the Łowicz Region from 1927 and to Pope John Paul II unveiled in 2000.

On the site of the current Cathedral Basilica, a wooden church was probably built in the 12th century. In the 14th century, it was replaced by a single-nave brick church with elements of bog iron ore. The remains of the Gothic temple were discovered during archaeological research in 2015. The expansion to the form of a three-nave basilica took place in the second half of the 17th century, carried out by the Poncino brothers. The founder of the expansion, carried out "at a more magnificent expense than the king's", was Primate Maciej Łubieński. Over the centuries, distinguished European artists worked at the Łowicz collegiate church, including Hieronim Canavesi, Jan Michałowicz from Urzędów, Giovanni Battista Falconi, Tylman from Gameren, Konstanty Tencalla, Karol Bay, Efraim Szreger, Szymon Bogumił Zug, Jakub Fontanna, Jan Jerzy Plersch, Adam Swach. In 1992, the church became a Cathedral, and in 1999 it gained the rank of Basilica. In 2012, the Łowicz church was entered on the list of historical monuments.

Founded in 1778 by Helena Radziwiłłowa. The architectural and garden setting was developed by Szymon Bogumił Zug with great personal involvement and participation of the duchess. Architectural ideas were sketched by Jan Piotr Norblin and Aleksander Orłowski, which were implemented until 1797 by Zug, and later by Henryk Ittar. The duchess began to establish the garden in the spring of 1778, but she continued to develop and compose it for over twenty years, until her death in 1821. The first buildings to be built on the shore of the great Arcadian pond, which was dammed in 1781, were the Cascade and the Cottage by the Waterfall (1781), and a little later the Temple of the High Priest (1783) and the Temple of Diana (1783-1785) with a ceiling by Norblin depicting the Morning Star, and the Aqueduct (1784). In the years 1785-1789, a symbolic Tombstone of the Duchess was built on Poplar Island with an ambiguous Latin sentence Et in Arcadia ego, modeled on the Tomb of Jean Jacques Rousseau in Ermenoville, as well as the Grotto of the Sibyl built of field stones, the rustic Cottages of Philemon and Baucida, the Stone Arch, the Corner of Melancholy, the Gate of Time, the altar circle on the Island of Offerings. In the 1990s, the expansion of Arcadia continued under Zug's direction. At that time, the House of the Murgrave adjacent to the Stone Arch and the Gothic House above the Grotto of the Sibyl were built. In the last years of the passing century, the interior of the Etruscan Cabinet was decorated in the Temple with a neoclassical interior and paintings by Michał Płoński and Aleksander Orłowski. Around 1800, the Duchess turned towards the aesthetics of a romantic garden. At that time, the garden in Arkadia expanded from the small and previously closed area of the sentimental park to the surrounding vast fields located behind the Skierniewka River, freely incorporating viewing axes and new buildings into the vast space of the surrounding natural landscape. The Duchess's bold intentions from that time were implemented in Arkadia by a young romantic visionary, an extremely talented architect of the new generation, Henryk Ittar. At that time, the Tomb of Illusions (1800) was built on the Champs Elysees located behind the river, the Roman Circus (1803) and the Amphitheatre (1804). A little later, the folk Swiss House was built, concealing fairy-tale "crystal interiors" (1810), which the Duchess located among the buildings of the Arcadian village.

This church, as a beautiful monument ("pearl of the Baroque") is an inseparable part of the Old Town of Łowicz. It was built in the years 1672-1680 from the foundation of Jan Szamowski - the castellan of Gostyń and Wojciech Zimny - a peasant from Bobrowniki and other benefactors; expanded from the foundation of Archbishop Michał Radziejowski in the 17th/18th century. The church was solemnly consecrated in July 1749. The hosts of the church and the college since 1668 have been the Piarist fathers.

Built in 1784 over a water cascade. Modeled on the architecture of Roman waterworks. Functionally, it is a bridge connecting the banks of the Łupia River right at the mouth of a large pond. The design of the Aqueduct from 1784, signed by Szymon Bogumił Zug, has been preserved. The additions to the structure were designed in 1800 by Henryk Ittar. After 1864, the Aqueduct was completely dismantled by subsequent owners of the Arcadian park. In 1951, Gerard Ciołek reconstructed the structure and tidied up the water network. The aqueduct "starred" in the film adaptation of "Mr. Kleks' Academy" (the one with Piotr Fronczewski).

The architectural and garden setting was developed by Szymon Bogumił Zug with great personal involvement and participation of the princess. Architectural ideas were sketched by Jan Piotr Norblin and Aleksander Orłowski, which were implemented until 1797 by Zug, and later by Henryk Ittar. The princess began to establish the garden in the spring of 1778, but she continued to develop and compose it for over twenty years, until her death in 1821. The first buildings to be built on the shore of the great Arcadian pond, which was dammed in 1781, were the Cascade and the Cottage by the Waterfall (1781), and a little later the Temple of the High Priest (1783) and the Temple of Diana (1783-1785) with a ceiling by Norblin depicting the Morning Star, and the Aqueduct (1784). In the years 1785-1789, a symbolic Tomb of the Duchess was built on Poplar Island with an ambiguous Latin sentence Et in Arcadia ego, modelled on the Tomb of Jean Jacques Rousseau in Ermenoville, as well as the Grotto of the Sibyl built of field stones, the rustic Cottages of Philemon and Baucida, the Stone Arch, the Corner of Melancholy, the Gate of Time, the altar circle on the Island of Offerings. In the 1990s, the expansion of Arcadia continued under Zug's supervision. At that time, the House of the Murgrave adjacent to the Stone Arch and the Gothic House above the Grotto of the Sibyl were built. In the last years of the passing century, the interior of the Etruscan Cabinet was decorated in the Temple with a neoclassical interior and paintings by Michał Płoński and Aleksander Orłowski.