What is a “kamienica” in Polish?
Odpowiedź na zarzuty o kamienicę i prywatność
B2 Polish listening practice · Standard Polish · Picked for people who know more
Kamienica is the Polish word for an older multi-story apartment building, often pre-war and ornate, with stucco facades and inner courtyards that line many of the older streets of Polish cities. Owning one can signal old money, shrewd inheritance, or a post-1989 reprivatization win.
In this celebrity reel, a woman defends herself: “my husband doesn’t have a kamienica in Warsaw, but I have one in Łódź.” The Warsaw-versus-Łódź beat is a classic Polish jab. Łódź, Poland’s third-largest city, sits about 130 km from Warsaw and has long been compared with the capital. Owning a kamienica in Łódź signals different ambitions than owning one in Warsaw.
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Harder words in this video
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Source: wordfreq 3.1.1 (general) · SUBTLEX-PL 2014 (spoken). These numbers are close, not perfect.
- ▸In Polish real-estate content and Otodom listings
- ▸In Polish films set in pre-war Warsaw or Łódź (Ziemia obiecana by Andrzej Wajda)
- ▸In Polish wealth-and-class debate columns
- ▸In Polish reality TV about renovating old buildings
- ▸In Polish family arguments about inheritance and zachowek