Among the most famous Polish bon mots is the replica of the Bride from the drama Veselka Stanisław Wyspiańskiego Trza być w butach na weselu (I have to wear shoes at the wedding), when the bride refused to take off her pressure shoes. However, few people know that Jadwiga Mikołajczykówna, the wife of playwright Lucjan Rydel, who was the model for the character of the Bride, spent part of 1915 in Prague with her husband. The Rydel couple were Krakow celebrities of their time, and they were driven from their home for a time by the First World War. They found refuge in Prague’s Vinohrady, a district known as la dolce vita of the cream of Prague, where ornate Art Nouveau facades and streets lined with mature trees are slightly reminiscent of Paris, while the quality of the local cafes can boldly match it. The poet and playwright Lucjan Rydel from the generation of the so-called Young Poland was a great original and individualist, and he was not far from eccentricity. He was famous for his talkativeness, which gave rise to the saying It rains, it rains, it rains and Rydel talks, talks, talks. Winning the heart of the sixteen-year-old daughter of a poor farmer in Bronowice near Krakow, with whom he fell head over heels in love, certainly gave him less work than convincing her parents. In the end, it happened, and on November 20, 1900, he married Jadwiga, who was 13 years younger. He also invited Stanisław Wyspiański, his friend from school years with a broad artistic background, to the wedding. This event inspired Wyspiański to paint his most important work Veselka. The Krakow premiere of the theater production in 1901 was a social scandal, but also the key to his fame as a playwright. However, it did not bring much joy to the Rydels. It is full of fantastic motifs, and Jadwiga actually had little to do with the character depicted; a subtle, gentle, shy and quiet girl left the show in tears, Lucjan, portrayed as a comic character desperately trying to find his wife in the countryside, felt insulted. After the outbreak of the First World War and the advance of the troops, the Rydels were forced to leave Kraków in September 1914. Despite their short stay in Pardubice, they moved to Prague with their children and maid because they were running out of money and there were more opportunities to earn money in Prague. Lucjan Rydel got the children a place at a Polish secondary school and found a decent, gas-lit apartment for the family. It was located in today’s Římská Street in Vinohrady, not far from the impressive National Museum. The whole area actually shone with newness at the time, as the nearby Míru Square was surrounded by recently built exhibition apartment buildings, as well as its dominant feature, the Church of St. Ludmila or Na Vinohrady theater, which staged Rydel’s play The Magic Wheel. However, this was not the only play by Rydel that was performed in Prague. Already in the spring of 1904, the National Theater staged his drama Forever. The proud lady Jadwiga preferred to go to the Elektra market on Wenceslas Square to buy fruit and vegetables in traditional Krakow costume. Already at that time, an electrified track along which trams ran along the entire length of the square had already been installed. You can take a ride in the same historic car that decorated Austria-Hungary, which was driven by the Rydel family back then. Historic Line 42 route crosses Wenceslas Square and passes by the most important Prague monuments. But you won’t find the market in those places anymore – it used to be on the site of today’s Ligna Palace, in the passage of Světozor is the famous Fruit Confectionery. The newly established English nature park Riegrovy sady offered the family a place to relax just a 10-minute walk from the apartment. We can still recommend a walk through the park, at the top of which there is a large garden restaurant with a view of Prague Castle and Mala Strana. In May 1915, the situation at the front no longer prevented the Rydels from returning to their homeland, and after the end of the school year, the family returned to Kraków; Rydel accepted the position of editor-in-chief of a new magazine devoted to literature and art, as well as the position of director of the Municipal Theater in Krakow. Despite his short stay in Prague, Lucian Rydel became a key figure in Polish-Czech cultural relations.