Home of the Croatian Homeland War Veterans (Dom hrvatskih branitelja), Pula

Today it is the home of veterans of the Croatian Homeland War with the Maritime Library, the regional broadcasting studio of the Croatian Radio-TV, the bar, the restaurant and the Istrian Book Fair, which takes place every year in December (source: istria -culture.com/en/the-home-of-the-croatian-homeland-war-veterans-i148).

The Sea Casino, now known as the home of Croatian Homeland War veterans, was an architectural jewel of Pula. After its completion, it gathered the elite from Pula and abroad.Also known as the Home of Croatian Home War Veterans, the Seaside Casino was built in 1872 during the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It was the architectural jewel of Pula. Designed by the architect Friedrich Adam from Munich, it soon became the place for fashionable gatherings of the Pula elite of the time and was praised by opera composers Franz Lehar, Emperor Franz Joseph I, Charles I of Austria or the German Emperor Wilhelm III. visited. Evening entertainment and themed lectures made the Marinecasino too small, so it was demolished in 1910. The new building, even more glamorous than its predecessor, was designed by Viennese architect Ludwig Baumann and erected in 1913 on an area of 15,000 square meters. The new building had the so-called winter garden, a beautiful main corridor leading to the concert and ballrooms, the terrace, the garden and the surrounding park. The winter park was decorated with double-fluted Doric columns leaning against the glass ceiling, while the main hall had a stage and a three-sided balcony. The main façade is beautifully structured architecturally, a three-storey building with a clearly separated ground floor, emphasized by rustically clad stone, while the remaining two floors were simple, smooth surfaces. The first two floors have semi-circular windows, while those on the top floor are rectangular. The central part of the facade is emphasized by a bay window and the covered entrance on the ground floor by two rectangular and two round columns used as balconies on the first floor. Two half-columns extend from the balcony to the roof. Apart from the central The side parts are also emphasized by a mild wreath and differently grouped openings on the first floor, mullioned windows with semicircular terminations. Rectangular mullioned windows adorn the second floor. After WW1, the casino first became the seat of the Italian administration and then the seat of the Yugoslav People's Army when it was used as a repeat cinema (source: istria-culture.com/en/the-home-of -the-croatian-homeland-war-veterans-i148).

Nice building with idyllic garden