Rumbach Street Synagogue

• 1075 Budapest, Rumbach Sebestyén u. 3.

The synagogue was designed by the most renown Viennese architect of the late 19th-early 20th century, Otto Wagner, the creator of architectural modernism. It was built between 1868 and 1872. The building is the most stunning example of arabesque synagogues around the world, with probably the nicest inner space amongst the synagogues of Budapest. The earlier, smaller temples of Budapest’s Jewry were situated in the court of the Orczy-House, a conglomerate of many buildings on the corner of Király utca and Károly körút. The building was rented to the Jews by the Orczy barons before 1840, when royal cities prohibited their settlement. After 1840 the parliament permitted Jews to acquire real estate and the Jews in Budapest soon intended to erect a Synagogue on a separate piece of land (…)
Prayers were held in the Rumbach Street Synagogue until 1959. At the end of the 80’s, a construction company bought the property and decided to completely restore it, then to sell the building. This restoration was carried out only to some degree, however; the street façade and the structure of the synagogue were refurbished and the cover of the inner walls was redone. In 1992 the company went bankrupt and in exchange for its liabilities, the building was handed over to the Hungarian Privatization and State Holding Company (ÁPV), from where it was returned to the Budapest Jewish Community (…)

Programs at Rumbach Street Synagogue