Victor Babeș Boulevard
Built by Arpad Mühle, between 1909-1910, the house, with its garden, was one of the most beautiful properties in Timisoara.
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Mühle's garden along with Niemetz’s, were in the second half of the 19th century, the most important gardens in Elisabetin, and the families who owned them occupied a prominent place in this neighborhood. Their cultures were oriented in two main directions, namely, plant cultivation and the development of tree nurseries.
The Mühle family, whose roses were famous across the borders of the monarchy, mainly deals with the cultivation of ornamental plants, many other species of flowers, but also seed culture. Originally from Bohemia, Wilhelm Mühle, became one one of the most famous horticulturists in Europe. After settling in Timisoara he got employed within horticulturist Niemetz’s company and soon he became co-owner of the company. In 1876 he set up a nursery in the Elisabetin district and opened a flower shop, which both became famous. His rose garden supplied Southeast Europe with flowers, but also Budapest and Vienna as a supplier for the royal and Imperial court. In the same year, he opened a store on the current Alba-Iulia street in Timișoara. He has participated in numerous exhibitions, being involved in organizing some, including the great Industrial-Agrarian Exhibition from 1891 in Timișoara. He was also the editor of the Rózsa Újság publication, in which he published specialized articles. His son, Árpád Mühle, a renowned horticultural technician, succeeded him in leading the company, enlarging the garden with three more square jugs on Bischof road (today M. Viteazu Blvd.) bought in 1901 from the city. His brother-in-law, the gardener Franz Niemetz, was recognized in the field of nurseries, its first and most beautiful garden being in Elisabetin, at the end of Kronen street (today Independenței street), owning a garden also in Calea Aradului.
The house of the Mühle family was built by Arpad Mühle between 1909-1910. In the first decades of the twentieth century the house with its garde was one of the most beautiful properties in Timisoara. A home with a basement and high ground floor, built in eclectic style with neo-baroque influences, punctuated by the shape of the roof and the staircase from the entrance. The last descendants of the Mühle family left for Germany in 1992, and the house, which has changed a number of owners in recent decades, is now in an advanced stage of degradation.
Bibliography:
- Josef Geml, Vechea Timișoară în ultima jumătate de secol 1870-1920, Cosmopolitan Art Publishing House, Timisoara, 2016, 117-118.
- Nicoleta Demian et al, Personalities from Banat, National Museum of Banat, Timișoara, 2018, p. 26.
- https://www.banatulazi.ro/casa-unui-erou-al-timisoarei-ruinata-de-clanul-carpaci/ site accessed on March 15, 2020 .
- https://heritageoftimisoara.ro/cladiri/Elisabetin/adresa/Mihai+Viteazu/3 – site accessed on March 16, 2020.
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Pia Brînzeu, Family diary manuscripts
Stop 8: The Mühle Family’s House on Mihai Viteazu Boulevard
September 9, 1938.Mother starts her private diary entitled “From the life of a young girl living in the 20th century”. She introduces herself: “My name is Carla Diel and I am the daughter of a well-known surgeon from Timișoara and the granddaughter of the much sought-after doctor Diel from Jimbolia.” She is seventeen and in the third and last year at the Amizoni College in Budapest, where rich girls are trained to be housewives. Their teachers think that the young women will become the managers of a “company” and will have to have confident skills: to know how to run a household, to manage the servants, to raise children, and to give correct instructions to the cook so she can cook well. Everything is devoted to the husband, with dedication and enthusiasm.
Mother spends her Sundays with the Capdebo family. Rozsi von Capdebo is grandmother’s friend, who moved to Budapest after her divorce, and Dezsö, her son, grew up with my mother in Timişoara.
In her diary, Mother describes her confused feelings: she is troubled and thinks she should know better whom she loves. Dezsö, who is twenty-five years old and is an attractive engineer, tall, with dark hair and dark eyes, or Laci Urbanetz, the dentist, who is thirty five years old, still with dark hair and dark eyes, but with a moustache. Mother is young and the war hasn’t started yet, so she feels optimistic. She has no financial concerns, as the family owns numerous properties: there is father’s sanatorium in Timişoara, grandfather’s house in Jimbolia, another house belonging to grandmother in Austria, an apartment in Budapest. They will all be hers one day, Mother writes, together with the several millions in the bank. So she can marry whoever she pleases, although the two men are not exactly poor.
Mother describes her inner struggles fervently. Her dialogue with her diary (“my dear diary”, “you may think I abandoned you because I haven’t written for so long”, “I’m glad that I came back to you”) is also lively. She doesn’t know who will read her notes, maybe a young girl who will understand her emotional uncertainties. And how can she be certain when Dezsö is disappointing her by being selfish and hypochondriac, and Laci doesn’t love her because she is too young? She decides, after a year of long inner debates and with the wisdom of the eighteen years she reaches at last, to let Laci win the case. She would be happy to marry him, Mother confesses, especially since he complimented her for wearing a very chic expensive dress, sewn at Mrs. Traxel’s studio (a seamstress mentioned, together with the Urbanetz family, in The Sunken Church Bell, one of Livius Ciocârlie’s novels about the old Timişoara,).
As a consequence, Dezsö is gloomy and edgy. He is courting her more and more assiduously; he senses that he has lost the fight and is lurking around her, feeling to the utmost his fall from grace. He doesn’t know that the destiny will push Mother in other directions and all that will be left from my mother’s love for Urbanetz will be a Rosenthal porcelain basket received for Christmas, an Empire crystal chandelier from the doctor’s mother and a couple of fillings I got during my childhood.
Mother will pass away six decades later. She spends her last days moving back and forth between two worlds: the world of her physical sufferings here and the world of dreams, which already connects her to the departed. One of these dreams returns repeatedly and she confesses it to me in a moment of lucidity: she arrives at an unknown train station and the one who is waiting for her to take her to a new, unknown destination, is Dezsö von Capdebo. When, after my mother’s death, I pluck up the courage to read her diary, I will realize that he was the one who finally won the battle, and that our feelings of love or our relationships with others never stop where we think they do.
House with Flowers
by Paula Cernicica, 7th grade
"Grigore Moisil" Theoretical High School Timișoara
Have you heard of the Flower House? Its history begins 150 years ago, when the building became the property of the Mühle family, who succeeded in making Timișoara the city of flowers.
Wilhelm Mühle was one of the most famous gardeners in Eastern Europe, having greenhouses and rose gardens with over 1500 species. Years later, Timisoara was awarded the title "City of Roses" thanks to him.
It is said that a long time ago there was a wealthy family who loved flowers. This famous family had only one daughter named Josephine. One day, while Josephine was practicing the piano, her parents decided to redecorate the garden, especially as it was approaching the birthday of their beautiful daughter. They were having a party. They asked around to see who could come and do some work in their garden, and in the end they called Wilhelm Mühle, the well-known young gardener from Timișoara.
A few days later, Mühle knocked on the family door. He was welcomed by Josephine's father. He gave her a small tour of his garden and explained what he would like to change. Before long, Josephine appeared in the courtyard shouting:
- Dad, Dad, come listen to my new song!
- I can't right now, I'm busy!" replied her father, sitting down in front of Josephine so that he couldn't see the gardener.
- But...who is the young man in the back?
- None of your business! replied the father, not knowing how to hide the fact that he was preparing a surprise.
- Okay...sorry to bother you...
After Josephine walked back into the house, Mühle froze for a minute. Until then he had never seen such a beautiful girl.
He got to work. You could have spent a whole day analyzing how painstakingly and passionately he did his work. He was dedicated. You could see that whatever he did, he did with passion.
After several days of hard work, Mühle finally finished the garden. The father invited Josephine to see what a wonderful job the young man had done. She was delighted with the gift and thanked both the gardener and her parents profusely.
Since he saw Josephine, something happened in Mühle's heart... He fell in love. Not knowing how to impress her, especially as he was a simple gardener and she was a daughter from a wealthy family, he thought of giving her a large bouquet of flowers for her birthday.
Leaving the bouquet on the family's doorstep, he went back home. Tied to the bouquet was a small string with a little note with his name, address and a few good wishes. Josephine picked up the bouquet, read the greetings on the note and smiled impressed.
The next day, her parents were gone all day. Josephine snuck out of the room. She took a rather secluded route, as almost everyone knew her, and she didn't want to make trouble. In a short time, she arrived at Mr. Mühle's house, and he received her with respect and showed her the greenhouses with the various varieties of roses he was then working on.
To aspire to the heart of Josephine, he thought he had to be more than just a gardener. So he started creating new varieties of roses and commercializing them. In particular, he created a variety with golden petals that he called 'Madame Josephine'. He soon became wealthy and famous, and with the money he earned he built himself an imposing house. In the process, he won both Josephine's parents' trust and her heart.
They didn't wait long and had a big wedding to which all the important people were invited, and then moved into their new home. A few years later, Josephina gave birth to their son, Arpad.
For many years they were all in the flower business, until Mühle was taken by a terrible illness. Wanting to carry on his love of flowers, Arpad took over the family business.
Today, the place where the Mühle family sold their flowers, located on Alba Iulia Street, is called "The House with Flowers", because, since it was built, the walls of this house have been perfumed with the fragrance of roses, which the Mühle family took care of so dearly.