Cathedral of Archangel Michael through time

Warsaw 1905–2025 16 photos of this spot

16 photographs taken at the same spot in Warsaw, spanning 1905–2025 — 11 of them from before 1980. Line them up and watch the place change.

This 1905 photograph shows a synagogue in Warsaw, then home to one of Europe's largest Jewish communities. Most of the city's grand prewar synagogues were later destroyed during the Second World War.

EU: Warsaw. Synagogue (1905) 1905 This 1905 photograph shows a synagogue in Warsaw, then home to one of Europe's largest Jewish communities. Most of the city's grand prewar synagogues were later destroyed during the Second World War.

EU: Pałac Kossakowskich w Warszawie (1922) 1922 The Kossakowski Palace in Warsaw is pictured in this 1922 photograph, a historic aristocratic residence in the city.

EU: European Hotel in Warsaw (1928) 1928 The European Hotel in Warsaw is pictured in this 1928 photograph, a well-known hotel in the city between the wars.

EU: Bristol Hotel in Warsaw (1934) 1934 The Bristol Hotel in Warsaw, photographed in 1934. Opened in 1901 on Krakowskie Przedmieście, the hotel was one of the city's most prestigious addresses in the interwar period.

EU: Teatr Polski w Warszawie (1937) 1937 The Polish Theatre in Warsaw, photographed in 1937. Opened in 1913, Teatr Polski was one of the city's leading stages for Polish-language drama in the interwar years.

EU: Warsaw. Morning (1938) 1938 A morning scene in Warsaw, photographed in 1938, captures the Polish capital as it appeared just two years before the outbreak of the Second World War brought widespread destruction to the city.

EU: Warszawa. Piaskarze (1938) 1938 'Piaskarze,' or sand-diggers, at work in Warsaw in 1938. These laborers dredged and carried sand from the banks of the Vistula, a common trade in the prewar city.

EU: Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie (1938) 1938 The National Museum in Warsaw, photographed in 1938. Established in 1862, the museum's building on Aleje Jerozolimskie had opened only a few years before this image was taken.

EU: Marszałkowska Street in Warsaw. (1938) 1938 Marszałkowska Street in Warsaw, pictured in 1938. One of the city's principal north–south thoroughfares, it was lined with shops, offices, and apartment buildings before wartime destruction.

Bundesarchiv Bild 121-0279, Warschau, zerstörte Gebäude 1939 A photograph from the German Federal Archive (Bundesarchiv) showing damaged buildings in Warsaw during the 1939 siege of the city, part of the German invasion of Poland that opened the Second World War.

EU: Urban, Warsaw (1976) 1976 A street scene in Warsaw, Poland, photographed in 1976 during the era of the Polish People's Republic, when the city was still rebuilding from wartime devastation decades earlier.

Cathedral of Archangel Michael 2010 The Cathedral of St. Michael the Archangel and St. Florian in Warsaw's Praga district, photographed in 2010. Completed in the early twentieth century in Neo-Gothic style, it is one of the tallest churches in the Polish capital.

Romuald Traugutt Park in Warsaw 2012 Romuald Traugutt Park in Warsaw

A gift from and monument to Josif Stalin in the middle of contemporary Warsaw 2012 The Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw, Poland, photographed in 2012. Completed in 1955 as a gift from the Soviet Union under Stalin, the skyscraper remains the tallest building in Poland and a landmark of the capital's skyline.

Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw in the evening, June 2019 Warsaw's Palace of Culture and Science glows in the evening light in this June 2019 photograph. Built between 1952 and 1955 as a gift from the Soviet Union, the skyscraper remains one of the tallest buildings in Poland and one of the capital's most recognizable landmarks.

Skyline of Warsaw, Poland 2025 Warsaw's skyline mixes postwar reconstruction with modern high-rises, a visible record of the Polish capital's near-total destruction and rebuilding after the Second World War.