COLONEL HADŽIĆ’S HOUSE

This building is located on the corner of the west side of the Kralja Milana Square, as a part of the preserved old environment entities, and was reconstructed in the 1980s (Arch. Danica Janić). It is assumed that it was the first building in Niš to be built in the ‘European’ style in 1882, as a single-story building with shops. It was owned by Colonel Svetozar Hadžić, the first commander of the Niš forces after the liberation from the Turks.

After 1914, most probably after WWI, it was reconstructed in the spirit of the European civil architecture of the time, with upgraded floors, a cantilever dome on the corner of the balcony facing the market, and shallow decorations in the attic. The first floor of the building was used as a residential area and the ground floor was a grocery store, which housed “civil casinos” between the two wars.

In the early 1990s, the “McDonald’s” company reconstructed this building along with its neighbor, which was once the “Balkan” tavern, and turned it into a fast food restaurant.