On the Path to Urban Deconcentration
Housing Construction in the Hinterland Zone of Wrocław at the End of the 20th Century

The socialist period in Poland and other states in Central and Eastern Europe was associated with the country’s planned industrialisation and urbanisation. The effect of such a policy was the progressive development of urban areas, especially large cities, and an increase in the concentration of population in their area. This growth was fostered by the […]

Solving the Housing Crisis in Interwar Košice
Examples of Social Housing for the Unemployed and Impoverished

Even prior to the First World War, the challenging or indeed catastrophic housing situation in Košice was a regular topic of discussion in the city’s press. The war years, followed by the collapse of the Habsburg Empire and the establishment of the First Czechoslovak Republic, threw the city into an entirely new reality, yet still […]

The Synagogue in Trenčín and Its Authors
A Transformation of Architectural Traditions through Modernity

The synagogue in Trenčín is one of the most important examples of synagogue or sacral architecture of the early 20th century in Slovakia, but also of the architecture of this period in the wider Central European region. As a result, it is mentioned in many texts, though its published information differs in many ways. In […]

The Healthcare Policy of the First Czechoslovak Republic
The Case of Uzhhorod

After Subcarpathian Ruthenia became part of the First Czechoslovak Republic in 1919, the government faced numerous challenges in the development of the healthcare system in the region and its capital. The paper aims to examine the impact of the Republic’s legislative framework and the peculiarities of Uzhhorod’s needs on priorities in the construction and, in […]

Preservation Issues of Architecture from the Second Half of the Twentieth Century

Late Modernist architectural works are confronted with an ambivalent situation between heritage acknowledgement and physical destruction. The text aims to explain the growing interest in their protection as a natural evolution of monument preservation, yet simultaneously questions the effectiveness of current procedures regarding the specifics of the given architecture. The Mäusebunker case study illustrates an […]

Polish Modernism’s Essentialist Claim
The Hansens and Open Form Architecture

This paper traces the continuities between the post-war Polish husband-and-wife architect duo of Oskar and Zofia Hansen, and their predecessors from the interwar avant-garde, the husband-and-wife artist duo of painter Władysław Strzemiński and sculptor Katarzyna Kobro. It argues that the Hansens’ Open Form (1958) approach extended the essentialism of Strzemiński and Kobro’s theory of Unism […]

Exclusive Histories, Unseen Narratives

The canon is generally understood as a body of the most important personalities and key works in a particular field, and for various reasons it evokes an impression of objectivity and impartiality. But is it really objective, or does it exclude someone or something? The study provides a critical reflection on the principles of the […]