MNB Üdülő, Visegrád, Hungary /// 2014.08.03. @Ati @Levi RATING: ✪✪✪✪ DIFFICULTY: medium SIZE: 9 buildings, 4 stories

Attila Deák

22:00 20th March 2024 Published by: Attila Deák

The Story
Videos
Location

We were just trekking from the famous Salamon Tower to the Visegrád Castle, one of the most important historical landmarks of Hungary, when we saw a broken fence, and an abandoned building hidden behind the untouched jungle-like bushes and plants. We decided to climb in and check what is it. It was the biggest surprise of the year, we discovered a huge abandoned hotel with dozens of hotel rooms, amazing graffiti everywhere, and a 33m long swimming pool. It’s still my favorite urbex place in Hungary. The walls are full of high-quality paintings, which makes the place a graffiti exhibition. The world-famous graffiti artist, Fat Heat has got a lot of his best paintings here.

MNB Üdülő, Visegrád, Hungary /// 2014.08.03. @Ati @Levi RATING: ✪✪✪✪ DIFFICULTY: medium SIZE: 9 buildings, 4 stories

Attila Deák

22:00 20th March 2020 Published by: Attila Deák

The Story
Videos
Location

We were just trekking from the famous Salamon Tower to the Visegrád Castle, one of the most important historical landmarks of Hungary, when we saw a broken fence, and an abandoned building hidden behind the untouched jungle-like bushes and plants. We decided to climb in and check what is it. It was the biggest surprise of the year, we discovered a huge abandoned hotel with dozens of hotel rooms, amazing graffiti everywhere, and a 33m long swimming pool. It’s still my favorite urbex place in Hungary. The walls are full of high-quality paintings, which makes the place a graffiti exhibition. The world-famous graffiti artist, Fat Heat has got a lot of his best paintings here.

LOCATION

If you need the exact location of this site, please support us via Paetron, and we’ll give you the exact location of this urbex site with thousands of other urbex site locations in our customized Google Urbex Map.

The Urbex Club’s Map

Approximate location:

THE STORY

This was the former hotel of the MNB (Hungarian National Bank)

This was the former hotel of the MNB (Hungarian National Bank), which was built in 1977. It was expanded to a bigger hotel later.
János Kádár, the communist dictator of Hungary, spent much more time in Visegrád in the MNB resort, where he had his own room at the end of the corridor than in the main party resort in Balatonatoniga.

Here is the story what we’ve found:

During the construction of the holiday building and the road leading to it, many areas of archaeological value were endangered. The excavations were led by Sándor Soproni and Mátyás Szőke. In 1970, three research trenches were designated in the area of ​​the fort outside the outer plane of the camp wall. In the research trenches, a double, religion-like trench surrounding the camp as well as the house remains dug into the trench were observed. In the third research ditch, a hitherto unknown U-shaped tower came to light. The following year (1971), road construction became necessary to identify the location of the camp gate. To this end, in line with previous observations, the trenches opened on the eastern side in 1951-52 was re-cleared and then expanded into sections. Following the direction of the wall remains in the sections, 10 more sections were opened in which the remains of a four-square tower were excavated.

During this excavation season, there were also opportunities for excavations inside the camp. 4 sections, as well as a small research trench, were opened to obtain information on the settlement inside the camp. It was built by famous interior designers, such as László Hornicsek: Hungarian interior designer, architect, industrial designer.1977–1978,  György Fürtös Relief, cladding (pyrogranite, 1981, Visegrád, MNB resort), Attila Bárkányi interior design (1993–94, MNB resort, János Bánáti, Sándor Csepregi). 28,190 sqm plot was MNB resort, in addition to real estate office use, institutional area and green area.

In Visegrád, the fifty-room resort hotel of the Magyar Nemzeti Bank was built above the Solomon’s Tower, designed by architect János Dianóczky, and its interiors by Kossuth Prize-winning interior designer László Hornicsek.

On the upper level, a large pyrogranite cladding was made on the two side walls next to the pool to decorate the swimming pool part, on which there was a relief. The undulating composition of the different geometric shapes was made on the basis of the Munkácsy Prize-winning ceramic designs of György Fürtös. The artist was an applied artist at the Zsolnay factory at the time, so presumably, the works were made there.

12 January 1977 Dolgozók Lapja (Workers Newspaper)

Up here, 100 meters above Solomon’s Tower, the air is 4 degrees cooler even in summer than on the waterfront, said foreman István Hegedűs apologizing when he saw a blue-frozen photojournalist getting out of the car. The foundation works of the new resort, which will be built under the walls of the ancient Visegrád, will be carried out by those belonging to the construction management of KOMÉP No. 34. The construction of the 50-room resort of the Magyar Nemzeti Bank does not stop even in cold weather. Yet the mercury wire of the thermometer is also below freezing here. On the hillside, however, there is a hacking and the sound of a squeaking shovel. Under the snowy trees, István Téglás and his cubic brigade break down the frozen ground.

The MNB resort, which will be built with an investment of about HUF 50 million, will be on one of the most beautiful shores of Visegrád. Above it is the citadel, at its feet is the tower of Solomon – further down, though the Danube meanders. During the foundation work of the resort, the builders have to deal with a lot of new technical problems. Led by József Töreki, your carpentry brigade already forms the floor structure of the ground floor. Near the ground, reinforced concrete fitters are working, while farther away, the wet concrete is slipping off the newly arrived Zil truck. Life is busy here near the favorite castle of King Matthias. ‘So far it has not been easy for us to say goodbye to Paul one of the carpenters’ – but we tried to stand up.
How true this is also evidenced by the fact that all the brigades worked even in the greatest cold.
Image and text: Justin

Later, the city of Visegrád didn’t have a swimming pool, so it was up to the educators responsible for the sport to organize other opportunities, e.g. swimming lessons have been held in the resort of the Magyar Nemzeti Bank since 1987 until the new Visegrád sports facility was built.

As a result of the discovery of irregularities around the reconstruction of the Visegrád resort in 1993, which also resulted in the cessation of the investment, the MNB replaced the management of MNB Bankjóléti Kft. and brought the company’s activities under close control.

1996: A flat-roofed, multi-story MNB resort was built next to the Solomon’s Tower (perhaps improved by the fact that the new owner, a foreign consortium, was rebuilding it into a gabled roof). the MNB’s building block was “stepped back” (nine rooms were built less due to integration into the landscape!)

The Visegrád resort was sold at the end of 1997.

The resort was started to rebuild again around 2010 and only the walls remained, so the work was partly destroyed, but it is still visible nowadays at the abandoned hotel’s swimming pool.

Since the unknown date, but around 2011 the hotel is totally abandoned, and it is one of the best-hidden paradises of the Hungarian professional graffiti scene with it’s perfect and infinite wall surfaces.

Artices about the Ghost Hotel in Visegrád (in Hungarian language):

VIDEOS

Videos from Youtube:

Video from 2019: Elhagyatott Hotel Frenkie urbex Graffity Hotel

Lost Hotel – Elveszett Hotel by Urbex Milaninho

Visegrád, graffiti hotel by Christo161

Please subscribe to our newsletter. We’ll send you e-mail only when there is a new Urbex Tour Post published, but maximum once a week.

About this Urbex Blog post: