It resembles a box of crayons or the spines of books stacked on a library shelf. The new community center in Kraków's Ruczaj district is slowly taking the shapes and colors envisioned for it by an unusual 2017 project. When will construction be completed and what will the Ruczaj Center offer residents?
The design for the new community center in Ruczaj was selected in a competition heldby Krakow's Municipal Investment Authority in 2017. Several local studios competed, and eventually the competition jury, working under the supervision of Borislav Czarakchev, chose the concept presented by the architectural studio Limba Eko. The output of the design studio founded by Anna Husarska is diverse, with a preponderance of rather avant-garde concepts and somewhat more down-to-earth realizations. Some time ago, the reconstruction of the inner courtyard of the Jozef Mehoffer Museum in Turek was completed, the erection of a school and kindergarten complex in Ostrow Mazowiecka is almost at the finish line, and Konin recently announced the start of work on the deconstructivist body of the new Music School, designed by Anna Husarska. Next year, on the other hand, construction of Krakow's Ruczaj Center, which began in February 2023, is expected to be completed.
Ruczaj Center
Photo: Przemyslaw Ciępka
home for culture
The new Ruczaj Center will stand on Jana Kantego Przyzby Street, on a small plot of land near the border of Ruczaj and Borek Fałęcki, in the center of a housing estate of communal blocks built in 2020. The Ruczaj center is intended to respond to the needs of male and female residents of the immediate area. As the former president of the city of Krakow, Jacek Majchrowski, informed, so far cultural activities have taken place in subleased and shared spaces, including in catechism classrooms. This is expected to change next year, as the activities of the Ruczaj Center will be based on a rich functional program.
Ruczaj center
Photo: Przemyslaw Ciępka
The cultural heart of Ruczaj
According to a spokesman for the Municipal Investment Authority, Ośrodek Ruczaj will offer residents access to a variety of spaces. There will be rooms for dance or gymnastics, music and art rooms, as well as a computer lab. There will also be educational rooms, where foreign languages will be taught, among other things.
Ruczaj center
Photo: Przemyslaw Ciępka
The heart of the building is to be an auditorium with an auditorium for nearly 300 people. Séances, performances, concerts and other shows are to be held here. A balcony will be overhung above the room , which designers have combined with a spacious foyer and cafeteria. The balcony will be accessible by an impressive spiral staircase. In addition to the above, the building will house rooms of an administrative nature - not only for the Center itself, but also for the Council of District VIII, which so far has had no permanent premises.
Ruczaj Center
photo: Przemyslaw Ciępka
hard work
All these functionalities have been spread over six floors, including two underground. The body of the building under construction is compact and quite unusual, based on a quadrilateral plan with rounded tops. The two top floors of the building have been extended ahead of the first floor level, creating a massive indentation in front of the entrance space and the entrance to the underground garage. It will certainly provide a bit of shade or protection from precipitation. This functionality is not unique, and could have been achieved in a much more aesthetically pleasing way - the forward extension looks sluggish, as if it were to collapse to the ground at any moment.
Ruczaj center
Photo: Przemyslaw Ciępka
rainbow community center
The most distinctive feature of the building is to be its unusual facade, obscured by hundreds of vertical light breakers. These have been planned (and partly already installed) in the form of rhythmically arranged slats in several colors, mainly yellow, orange and purple. They are intended to resemble a box of crayons, the colorful spines of books on a library shelf or the pipes of an organ. The cultural associations are perfectly fine, but the effect leaves a bit to be desired. The colors of the chiaroscuro are faded and do not harmonize with their surroundings. They also stand out strongly from the white plaster used to cover the facade. Perhaps they will look better after final cleaning, but at the moment it doesn't look good. These aren't the only problems with the new building - we've heard little so far about environmentally friendly solutions, and there are also doubts about how the land around the facility will be used. On the plot of land occupied by the Center under construction, 55 trees have been cut down. In return, the city promises to plant more than 160 new specimens within the district, which has already been partially realized. However, the full effect of the planting campaign will have to wait for many years, as the new trees have to grow after all.
Ruczaj center
photo: Przemyslaw Ciępka
a little more is needed for happiness
Construction of the Ruczaj Center is expected to last until April next year. The nearly completed body and facade of the building will probably not change significantly by then. Architecture, however, is not only about aesthetics, but first and foremost about the functions it performs - these, in the case of the new community center in Ruczaj, will respond to the needs of the residents of this rapidly developing neighborhood. It is gratifying that the City, while building a housing estate of communal blocks on Przyzby Street, has thought about the accompanying infrastructure , which is so important . However, we hope that the designs of future cultural investments in the city will not only be functional, but also beautiful.
