The end of December - because that's when we finished preparing the January issue - is the best time for all kinds of summaries. And like every year, we ask practitioners and architecture critics to write what they consider a success and what they consider a failure in a given year. We do this in the convention of Kits and Hits. We give our Authors and Authors total freedom of expression and exceptionally we do not moderate this discussion. We are simply very curious about it.
Anna Cymer on hits and putts in 2021
FromA&B issue 01|2022
Life in Poland is a string of surprises. Unfortunately, lately rather unpleasant ones. When in my last year's list of hits and putts I decided to describe only positive events, on the assumption that after a bad year it is better not to dwell on bad experiences, it was impossible to predict that the next year would end in the face of even more unpleasant events. So I consistently remain with hopeful, joyful, positive themes. In everyday life, politics, economics, social affairs we are surrounded by enough putty, there is no need to devote space for them here as well.
For those sensitive to our architectural heritage, the hero of the year was certainly Solpol. While the mere issuance by the authority of a permit for its demolition is a tragic "putty," the action to oppose the decision is cause for optimism. For it turned out that more and more people are open to less obvious forms of architecture, understand the value of heritage even when it is not "objectively beautiful," and finally that architecture can unite, integrate and, importantly, arouse very positive emotions. Happenings, joyful parties, meetings under the closed building have become - along with petitions and other "serious" actions - an important part of the campaign to defend Solpol, but also to make the unconvinced aware of its value and potential. This is a new phenomenon in the Polish debate on architecture - to defend a building not with gloomy demonstrations, but with joyful happenings. This, by the way, is another argument that Solpol should stay - so far no building in Poland has generated so much positive energy and joy.
There is one more piece of good news from Wroclaw this year - it concerns the purchase by Zbigniew Maćkow of the iconic "igloo" house designed by Witold Lipiński. The architect promises to turn the house into a public facility and make it available to visitors, and to preserve the unique character of the building. In this way, perhaps a unique, one-of-a-kind, yet small and modest, and therefore not easy to adapt building will be saved. One could learn about the often little-known but noteworthy houses from their residents themselves in a wonderful film series titled " The Housebreakers. "Homebuilders." Launched back in 2020, it was created thanks to the initiative of Poznan organizations: Open Center, Common Point, Made in Art Foundation and the Poznań branch of SARP. Magda Wypusz, Jakub Głaz, Andżelika Jabłońska and Simon Kos, who coordinated the project, showed that it is possible to talk about residential architecture in a way that is both unpretentious and fascinating. The series of films "Domokrążcy" - focusing on Poznan, but also with installments on Wroclaw and Brno - is perhaps modest in form or budget, but full of momentum, a wonderful series of stories about houses in the broadest sense of the word "house": as an architectural block, a place in the city, but also a private, intimate space of the family.
Despite all its merits, "Homebuilders" will probably not make it to the list of Oscar nominees, but the work devoted to architecture in 2021 made it to another extremely prestigious group - the list of finalists for the "Nike" literary award. The book "The World's Best City. Warsaw in reconstruction 1944-1949" by Grzegorz Piątek, by a jury associated, after all, with literature, not architecture, was recognized as one of the seven best books of the year in Poland. This is the first time that a publication on what is still, after all, a "niche" subject has received such recognition outside the architectural community. The recognition was fully deserved, as Grzegorz Piątek told the post-war history of the capital reliably and emotionally at the same time, conveying both technical and ethical dilemmas, urban and political clashes and challenges, presenting the participants in this unprecedented undertaking of reconstruction (or building anew) as people with their emotions, views and dilemmas.
The year 2021 brought gifts for those who like to read about architecture, watch movies about it, but also simply use it. Over the past twelve months, a lot of good has happened at Polish railway stations. Already on the occasion of Euro 2012, the first renovations of railroad stations showed that they are objects not only needed, but also valuable, interesting, worthy of attention because of their architecture. PKP and local governments, because these two entities manage the majority of Polish railway stations, by investing in the renovation of historic buildings, allow us to appreciate formal and spatial solutions anew; importantly, buildings in large and small cities are being carefully renovated. Thanks to them, the train stations in Przemyśl and Goczałkowice-Zdrój, Cieszyn and Oświęcim, Radymno and Wrocław are once again impressive. But it doesn't stop there. Another important phenomenon related to railroad buildings is surrounding them with conservation care. While buildings erected in the 19th or early 20th century (there are many such in Poland) are rather already in the registers of monuments, a new phenomenon is the protection of buildings from the second half of the 20th century. In the past year alone, the PKP railway stations in Tarnow-Moscice and Grudziadz became monuments, the body and interior design of the Warsaw-Śródmieście railway station was entered in the register, as was the exceptionally interesting bus station pavilion in Sulechów. Most of us still remember the times when a visit to a train station was an unpleasant necessity; a decade was enough for Polish railroad stations to become an attraction in themselves and interesting places worth visiting.
There were more positive developments in 2021. It is certainly worth appreciating the guidebook published by the Warsaw authorities, "School Well Designed. Architectural and functional standards for elementary schools and school-pre-school complexes of the City of Warsaw," which is intended to be a set of guidelines on how to build and renovate schools so that they are not only functional, but also pretty. On this occasion, one cannot omit the very successful edition of the WARSAW UNDER CONSTRUCTION festival just dedicated to schools, which returned, in a way, to its roots, showing the architectural phenomenon in a broader, social context. There seems to be no doubt that graduates with greater awareness and sensitivity will come out of well-designed schools.
Although the events of recent months show that the most important buildings in the country have become walls and fences, let's try not to forget these good events, lest we sink completely into pessimism.
