The main entry gate and walls of the Bagnówka Jewish cemetery in Białystok have been rebuilt and refurbished, in a project carried out by the city of Białystok in collaboration with the Białystok Cemetery Restoration Fund (BCRF), with input from the Nissenbaum Foundation. The BCRF has been spearheading research and restoration of the cemetery for years — we have posted regularly on its work.
As shown in a video posted by Tomasz Wiśniewski, the white plaster that had covered the walls and gate has been removed, leaving the brick exposed, and the rebuilt entryway restored pedestrian entrances to the side of the main gate.
“The highlight of this year’s improvement to the cemetery’s infrastructure was the complete rebuilding of the cemetery’s walls on the southern and western borders,” the BCRF said in its roundup of developments in 2025.
“Funded by the City of Białystok, work began in July 2025 and was completed in December 2025. New wrought-iron gates at both entrances were funded by the Nissenbaum Foundation in Warsaw thanks to the initiative of Amy Halpern Degen,” it said.
It said that the installation of the new walls “also revealed the foundations of the cemetery’s burial house just inside the main entrance at left” and that a visitor’s center or “welcome patio” is planned there, pending funding.
Images in a BCRF report show that the gate and walls were originally bare brick, without plastering. They were covered, the pedestrian entry (or entries) were removed, when the wall and entry were rebuilt (in the 1980s?).
The picture below (from 2006) shows Tomasz Wisniewski at the entrance as it looked before, without the pedestrian entry (or entries).
Read the BJCF report on its 2025 activities
Read the prospectus on restoration work, including the entrance and walls