Lukas Stege: Today I want to discover Gdask with you, a port city on the Baltic coast in the north of Poland.

While Gdask has a special meaning not only for Poland, but for the whole of Europe.

Do you want to know more?

You can't tell by looking at Scenic Gdask that it's a city in Europe marked by fate.

But we'll get to that in just a minute.

With its historic center, Gdas is one of the most popular city destinations in Poland.

♪ The old port on the Motawa River.

Without it, the Gdask of today would not exist.

It's lined with cafes and restaurants.

In the Middle Ages, it made Gdask the richest city in Europe.

I feel like going for a ride on the pirate ship.

It casts of several times a day.

♪ Lukas: This boat trip is perfect for a little break.

♪ The city is seamlessly connected to the port, which has developed around Gdask over the centuries.

It's the biggest port in Poland, with one of the largest repair yards in the world.

♪ For the people of Gdask, these cranes are a symbol of home.

Most of them belong to the old shipyard, which is the soul of the city.

Well, and not only that.

This is a place that fundamentally changed Europe.

Lukas: The famous Gdask shipyard.

Over 40 years ago, there was strike here by shipyard workers and with that began the decline of socialism in Poland an the end of communism in Europe.

♪ The struggle for workers rights gained momentum here.

Millions of Poles organized themselves in the Solidarno movement, fighting for freedom and democrac under an authoritarian regime.

The European Solidarity Center at the former shipyard tells this story.

♪ Solidarno.

This worker activism turned into an anti-communist opposition movement.

It spread across the whole country.

They reached their goals with the principle of non-violence.

Lech Wasa, a trained electrician and trade union leader, led Poland to independence.

In 1990, he became president and remained so for five years.

♪ These activists created change in a hopeless situation.

This is what the Solidarn movement still stands for today.

♪ Lukas Today, ships are no longer being built in the Gdask shipyard.

The area is still occasionally used by companies.

Most of the production halls are empty.

♪ It's a lost place for the time being.

But there are plans to creat a new chic urban district here based on the model of London's Docklands or Hamburg's HafenCity wit apartments, shops and offices.

The old shipyard area is like a huge adventure playground because the investor has left the empty spaces to artists, and now you can find galleries, rehearsal rooms and studios here.

[music and ambient sounds] Lukas: This character looks a bit like me.

We have the same nose.

♪ There are more spots in the shipyard that people in Gdask have take over and filled with new life.

The Stocznia is a containe settlement with lots going on.

♪ Here you can be loud and party until the early morning.

♪ And you can meet cool people.

[background noise] On the very spot wher the democracy movement in Poland began more than 40 years ago, life and freedom are now being celebrated.

Gdask gives us hope that history can change for the better at any time.

♪ Lukas: I really have to say, Gdask is impressive.

It's not just a big city by the sea with a beach a beautiful old town and, well, this really cool shipyard.

In this city, you can also feel the histor of Europe around every corner.

So Gdask is a place you should visit.

♪ Narrator (female voice): It glitters, it adorns and it costs a pretty penny.

Gilt leather is a luxury commodity steeped in history.

Ewa Zielinska and Agnieszka Kosakowska know the secrets of its creation.

in their little workshop in Kraków, Poland.

The sisters craft gil leather for walls and furniture, the way it's been done for some 400 years.

Ewa Zielinska: It was very popular in 17th and 18th century.

It was used in rich houses as upholstery or wall coverings.

Nowadays, it is quite, it's quite forgotten.

It feels like, like holding a piece of art.

Narrator The materials used are leather with plant based tanning and the finest silver leaf.

A special varnish makes the silver shine like gold, which is not even used in the gilding of leather.

Ewa: I think that the truth is that they used silver because it was cheaper than gold, and they just found a way.

Narrator: Perched atop Wawel Hill in central Kraków is the royal castle.

Its splendid art treasures testify to the vast wealth of bygone potentates.

The restoration of furnishings upholstered in gilt leather was Agnieszka first assignment as an art restorer.

Her imitations of the work of Old Masters are seen as near perfect.

Agnieszka Kosakowska: 19 years ago I remember it in your workshop and it was my first job with guilt leather.

The beginning of my love for gilt leather.

Narrator: The two sisters were exposed to a passion for preserving antique art treasures early on.

Their father, Edward Kosakowski, is renowned as one of Europe's leading art restorers.

In the 1990s he restored the royal castles centuries-old gilt leather panels.

Ewa The work was really difficult.

First of all, when they started it in the 1990s nobody really knew how to do it.

There were old books, there were techniques known from ages, but nobody was currently executing them, so the level of difficulty was very high.

Narrator: The methods developed long ago formed the basi for today's gilt leather craft.

For the first step in the process, Agnieszka coats the leathe with a wafer thin silver leaf.

On top of that comes several more steps, just like it was done 400 years ago.

The sisters used mostly natural materials.

Ewa So this is the white of the egg whipped, and we use it to protect the silver from getting black.

Narrator: Protected this way the shine may persist for many hundreds of years.

Once the silver leaf is bound to the leather, they can start embossing, which takes a lot of muscle today, just as it did long ago, even with the aid of a modern hydraulic press.

Agnieszka: Nice.

Narrator: Ewa Zielinska makes he own stamps to carve the leather.

She uses them to create fine textures and give every panel a character of its own.

Then comes the big moment.

Like magic, the silver is transformed into gold.

The illusion is virtually perfect.

Ewa Aga is applying the thin layer of transparent varnish, which is based on resins and as you will see in a moment, it will look like it was covered with gold.

Narrator It takes three months to create one such gilt leather panel.

It can run several thousand euros depending on the size and the effort put into it, a luxury few people can afford today.

Ewa: There's only a chance to preserve this craft if we find a function to it in the contemporary world.

So this has become our mission.

Narrator: The two sisters have just finished paneling an entire roo in Krakóws Wierzynek Restaurant The greatest achievement so fa in their quite unique careers.

Eva zu Beck: Hi, everybody, and welcome t Warsaw, the capital of Poland.

I'm super excited to be showing you around today because this was once my hometown.

Now I want you to d one quick little thing for me.

If you have any, any preconceive notions of Warsaw might be like, I want you to take them and chuck them out.

Because today what I'm going to show you is a slightly alternative side of the city.

♪ Eva: During the Second World War, the entire city was pretty much razed to the ground.

It was bombed into oblivion.

It basically ceased to exist.

None of these buildings actually survived the war.

So none of these building are the original, beautiful 19th century townhouses that you imagine them to be.

Poland was under a communist dictatorship after the Second World War and until 1989.

Now I was born after the fall of communism.

But the irony is not lost on me that the Museum of Polish Communism is located right above an American fast food joint.

All right, let's go and check it out.

♪ Eva: To a Polish person this is an actual apartment.

My grandma had an apartment just like this one.

And there's one thing I want to show you, which is the classic of Polish communist decoration, the glass fish.

Every single grandmother in Poland has one of these, I can guarantee.

♪ You know, the amazing thing is that, again I recognize all these products.

After the fall of communism, these things didn't just magically disappear.

You know, most people would have kept them in their homes.

So I remember as a kid using this very perfume, I remember using this perfume called The Green Apple.

Milk bars still exist in Poland, and that's where you'd go to find cheap traditional Polish food.

This is the classic of Polish cuisine, the dish that is the greates of all comfort foods in Poland.

The dish that you would make with your mom or your grandma at Christmas.

If you've neve had pierogi, you're not Polish.

So, pierogis are basically dumplings and they come with all sorts of fillings on the inside.

Some of the most popular ones are these ‘ruskie pierogi.

the filling is potato, cottage cheese and onion.

And of course sprinkle some fried onions on top and ideally add a little bit of cream.

And then you just bite in and enjoy the process.

Eva: Here in the grungy neighborhood of Praga, residential courtyards hide a fascinating secret.

Many of them are home to these tiny chapels or shrines.

Check out this chapel right behind me.

It's so beautiful and it just stands here, so majestic in the middle of this kind of grungy, dilapidated neighborhood.

During the Second World War, when going to church was just too dangerous, some of Warsaw's religious residents decided to build neighborhood chapels like these so that people would have a place to pray in without straying too far from home.

Over 100 of these chapels survived to this day.

♪ I have a map of Warsaw's street art here, and it's really cool, actually, because it can lead you to spots like this.

There's a giant piece of street art, a beautiful mural right behind you, but it's kind of hidden behind the buildings of one of Warsaw's main arteries.

You'd never find it without a map like this, and it's actually quite amazing because it's a real piece of street art.

Eva This is one of the most popular iconic spots in Warsaw to get donuts.

There's always a line.

There's a line today, but assure you it's worth the wait.

It's warm and fluffy and soft.

Check this out.

So what we've got here is it's just a beautiful piece of bakery icing sugar on top.

But inside, that's where you find the real gem.

So Polis donuts are made with rose jam.

Not raspberry jam, not strawberry jam.

Rose jam.

That's the real deal.

Are you ready?

I don't know if Im ready.

[music and ambient sounds] So this is Warsaw.

With so much history and character and a drive to always reinvent itself, it might just be the most fascinating city in Poland.

Eva zu Beck: Hey, everybody, this Eva zu Beck.

Today I want to show you the most beautiful village in the entire country.

But before we head over there let me take you on a super quick tour of Kraków the cultural capital of Poland.

Let's go.

Kraków pops up on most travel itineraries in Poland, thanks to its rich history and a fairytale beauty.

The entire old town is a UNESCO Worl Heritage Site, with architecture dating back to medieval and renaissance times.

In fact, Kraków as a city is so old that it predates the official establishment of Poland as a country.

Honestly, it's hard not to love it here.

But today I'm on my way to a very different kind of place a two hour drive away from Kraków.

It's a little less grand than the big city, maybe but it has an intriguing story of its own.

Eva: Alright, it looks like we've just arrived here in Zalipie.

Zalipie, by the way, is considered to be Poland's most beautiful village.

I see a map over there.

So let's stop for a second and see what exactly we can check out here.

All of thes color points are private houses, privately owned homes which are decorated in the traditional Zalipian style.

So let's start at the beginning.

Somewhere right here.

♪ Zalipie Is a small village wit a very specific claim to fame.

It first appeared on the tourist radar about ten years ago, when the story of its painted houses became widely shared in Poland.

We'll get to that story a little bit later in the episode.

For now, let's take a look around.

It looks like this courtyard is empty.

There's nobody here, but the gate is open to visitors, and there's a lot of people who come and check out the beautiful paintings on the houses.

So I think we're just gonna go inside.

♪ Wow, this place is absolutely beautiful.

Come take a look.

♪ Eva: I kno it doesn't really look like it, but this is a door that leads to a cellar.

It's probably the most beautiful cellar door I've ever seen in my life.

Check this out.

All of these colors.

All of these flowers are hand painted by the people who live in this house.

So you've got really lovely summer motifs.

You've got sunflowers, you've got orange and red and purple flowers.

You can see that the people who create these paintings really care a lot about keeping up tradition.

Check this out.

I'm super excited to show you this house specifically.

So I'm Polish and my great grandma used to live in a house similar to this one.

A house like this in Poland is called a khata and khatas are traditional wooden cottages with thatched roofs.

So this is what that is.

And in addition, because it's in Zalipie this khata is also painted.

After spending a couple of hours in the village, I met up with Maria, one of the traditional painters from Zalipie.

I wanted to ask her ho the flower paintings came about and what the newfound wav of tourism means to the village.

Maria Pikul: The flower paintin tradition is over 120 years old, and we're just standing next to the type of stove that inspired the tradition.

In the olden days, you'd find these stoves in all houses, and people would burn logs in them for warming up their homes and cooking.

The soot coming out of the leaky chimneys, black in the walls and the walls were dark.

There was no electricity so homes were quite dark inside.

Then some ladies in the village, using traditional brushes like this one, began to make little patches.

They started making different patterns and splashes, and with time they began to create primitive flower patterns.

Eva: Is tourism good for Zalipie?

Maria: Yes, I think so.

Tourists really enjoy coming here.

They love to stroll around and visit the painted houses, and owners are also happy t show off their beautiful homes.

Eva: I'm here with Maria, who is about to show me the local art of painting flowers.

So I'm about to learn something.

I've got this little piece of wood, I've got a brush, we've got some water, we've got some paint.

I think we're ready to get started.

♪ Eva: Well, it wasn't quite the same level of craf as the artists from the village, but let's sa it wasn't the worst of my work.

The final touch on my masterpiece is to write the name of the village Zalipie as a signature.

♪ Eva: So what do you think?

Maria: Very pretty.

Eva: The village of Zalipie i a great example of responsible tourism done right in Poland.

With all the homes and infrastructure in the hands of locals, and a true commitment to local culture that goes beyond catering to tourists.

It's one of those rare spots that feel just natural.

As for me I know that I'll be coming back.

Narrator (male voice): Mmm, tasty bagels: the quintessential New York delicacy - aren't they?

Not quite.

The bagel originated in Poland, Kraków, to be precise.

We'll tell you all about how th popular bread ring came to be.

Some are offered for sale right here - or wait.

That's not a real bagel, is it?

Obwaranki Seller : These are traditional Kraków Obwaranki with salt or puppy seeds.

Narrator: Obwaranki - and what are those, exactly?

Marta Krzyek-Siudak: We can say that Obwarzanek is the oldest, older cousin of bagel Marta Krzyek-Siudak founded Living Obwarzanek Museum in Kraków.

Marta The oldest proofs that Obwarank were present in Kraków are from 1394, so it's more than 600 years.

All people in Krakow we eat Obwaranki for breakfast, we eat them on the way to work, to school.

So this is lik a very common street food here.

♪ Narrator They differ from bagels mainl in that Obwaranki are twisted together from two strands of dough.

♪ But just as with bagels, the rings of raw dough are parboiled a little before they're baked.

That makes them crispier.

But what's their connection to bagels?

In Café Blossom, we find out.

Some say it serves the best bagels in town.

Klaudia Wtroba bakes 40 to 50 bagels a day.

They're made of yeast and doug and sprinkled with a seed mix.

Klaudia Wtroba: We just wanted t revive the old Kraków tradition.

We want our bagels to bake quickly and taste good at the same time.

So we came up with our own recipe and the bagels rise quicker and get done faster.

Narrator: Unlike the Obwaranki, the bagel is a traditional Jewish roll and of more recent origin.

We head over to Krakóws trendy Kazimierz district, the center of Jewish life in Kraków.

♪ Jonathan Ornstein got Kraków's Jewish Community Center up and running.

He came here from New York City now seen as the bagel capital.

Which does he prefer the original or the U.S.

version Jonathan Ornstein: I did just get back from New York City, so I even brought bagels back with me from New York City, as I do.

So I'm going to taste this bagel.

Yeah, it looks reasonably bageley.

Pretty good.

Not bad for Kraków.

Not bad.

A little different than wha I would call a New York bagel.

But considering wha you can get, not a bad version.

Narrator: The first writte mention of bagels was in edicts of Kraków's Jewish community in 1610.

♪ Jonathan: The bagel is not really a part of the religious practice of Jews.

It's just culturally, that's a thing, like on a Sunday morning, the most traditional thing you have, like this breakfast or brunch, you have bagels with lox.

So bagels with salmon, bagel with cream cheese is like very, very, very Jewish.

♪ Narrator: Eastern European Jewish immigrants brought the bagel to North America in the late 19th century.

♪ To the bakers at Krakóws Café Blossom, It's more than just a bread roll.

♪ Klaudia Wtroba: I do think its a really great tradition that's worth continuing.

This roll is so closely bound up with our city, with the legends of famed Kraków and its history.

Narrator: Now, is everyone hungry for a really good bagel?

Then the place to go is Krakow.

That's where to find the original.

♪ ♪ Maria Lastovetska: The best moment about eating a pierog is when you take the first bite.

When you first feel the dough, how soft and pleasant it is.

Magosia Minta: They are warm.

You have all the steam coming in your face.

This comfort comes both from the memories, from the atmosphere, from the flavor, but also from the texture of the dish itself.

♪ Maria: Im Maria, head chef at the Pierogama Syrena Irena and today I'm going to show you how pierogi are made.

♪ Here at the restaurant we have 15 different varieties of pierogi.

We have pierogi with wil garlic, ricotta, bryndza cheese and nuts.

It's a special taste.

We have sweet pierogi with poppyseeds, raisins and nuts.

Another variety with plum, brown butter and cinnamon.

World famous Russian pierog with potatoes and curd cheese.

There are pierogi with meat, our absolute hi are the ones with white sausage.

Of course we take oil, egg, 450 type flour and usually water.

The egg is sort of my secret to this dough.

It changes all the ingredients and they can bind together very well in this dough.

The egg allows us to make various frills as we knea and arrange the dough later on.

Maria: Today we have a dis unlike any other in the world.

It's going to be pierog with sauerkraut and mushrooms.

It's a traditional Christmas Eve dish.

♪ Most people rehydrate dried mushrooms.

I grind them into fine dust.

That adds a very intensive mushroom flavor.

♪ The filling is very important.

Every kind of pierogi has a distinct taste and you need to appreciate it mixed with the dough.

♪ We fold this dumpling and push it together with our fingers, squeezing from each edge so that none of the filling can get out.

Maria The water needs to be boiling.

When we drop pierogi into the pot, the water cools down, so we need to make sure it's boiling.

We can't boil them for more than 3 or 4 minutes because after that the dough may overcook.

♪ Magosia Minta Pierogi are a dish that is lik heavily connected with Poland.

They became a bit like our food icon, even though you can find them in different countries, mostl in Central and Eastern Europe.

I think that in Polan we are just super proud of them.

My name is Magosia Minta.

I'm a food journalist and reporter based in Warsaw, Poland.

One of the places now that we usually connect with pierogies are so-called milk bars.

They originated in the early 20th century, so all those like flour based dishes, for example, pierogies became a very popular because they are also very economic and they are very satisfying.

You can find them still in those milk bars, and you can have a portion for a few euros, but then you can also find like a pierogi or a pierogi- inspired dishes in the best fine dining restaurants.

And it just I think it's like the best proof that they have a very special place in our hearts.

Maria: Pierogis are something you cannot forget.

They make you feel good.

♪