Designing Tito's capital: urban planning, modernism, and socialism in Belgrade (original) (raw)
Related papers
Spaces of transition: testing high standard housing in late-socialist Belgrade
Planning Perspectives Volume 35, Number 6, 2020, 2020
The article explores housing models and hybrid typologies advanced as part of an urban renewal programme in Belgrade (Serbia, former Yugoslavia) in the 1980s. We argue that these typologies were tested against the socialistmodernist model of mass residential construction that had been dominant since the 1960s. Our research identifies the design methodologies employed in the insertion of collective housing typologies into an elite residential quarter of traditionally-planned detached family houses, in the case of high standard housing project Dedinje II/2 (1979–1986) designed by the architect Zoran Županjevac. The article particularly focuses on local adaptation of the transnational concept of designing spaces of transition between community and privacy. Instrumental in this adaptation, we aim to show, was the educational experience and professional practice critical of radical modernism gained by the architect in the USA, UK and Austria. In particular, we find that the project reflects the transfer of knowledge and experience across cultural, geographic and political contexts. The resulting typologies, we contend, not only represented an example of a pluralist approach to late-socialist architecture but provided models for re-thinking housing in the transition to the market economy of the post-socialist period.
New Belgrade: From a Socialist Ideal to a Fragmented Space of Fashionable Architecture
Post-Utopian Spaces, 2023
New Belgrade, home to about 250,000 inhabitants, is part of Belgrade, the capital of the Republic of Serbia. Despite this area’s slightly older history, New Belgrade’s large-scale development began after the end of the Second World War. This chapter critically examines one century of New Belgrade (1919-2020), focusing on its transformation since 1985 in response to profound changes in political and social environments. During the decades of construction, New Belgrade crossed the path from a socialist functional neighbourhood to a neoliberal space embodied in chaotic urbanism and expensive architecture. This chapter moves diachronically and synchronously through four periods, using a theoretical framework – the relationship of the social system, political leaders, city planning, management, and construction – to explain the development of New Belgrade.
Designing the Growth: Planners of Belgrade Housing
Women's Creativity since the Modern Movement (1918-2018) Toward a New Perception and Reception, 2018
When talking about Belgrade, and its expansion in the second half of twentieth century, one always falls into the trap of thinking about New Belgrade. Although a completely valid point of view, since it did house 250,000 of new inhabitants of Belgrade and it was planned by some of the most talented planners and architects of the country, I would argue that it is far too exceptional to be a good case study in this matter. As architect-planner Milica Jakšić recalled, only the most talented architects-planners were invited into the team for New Belgrade and they did not interact so much with the other teams, while architect-planner Vera Paunović commented on the imperative of multidisciplinary work for this urban laboratory. There were other notions to exceptionality of New Belgrade as well: it was envisioned as the federal capital, as the seat of the administration, was funded from various federal bodies and planned as a review of Yugoslav architecture. I would argue that it is precisely those developments that are not heavily featured in architectural journals that are being shyly mentioned as a footnote or being analysed from one point of view (i.e. just technology, or just design); those are the ones that ought to be analysed. In this case, I will stick more closely to the various aspects of the profession, without analysing the historical and systemic problems of the women’s employment in the field of architecture and urban planning in Serbia/Yugoslavia. Here, I would like to analyse the plans, projects and developments that were known for authorship of women planners, but somehow ended marginalized, although once featured as potential future successes of Belgrade housing economy. In this case, we will stay on the right bank of Sava River and examine the other housing estates of Belgrade, the famous ‘not-so-famous’ and ‘not-so-successful’ estates of Šumice and Konjarnik, Braće Jerković and Medaković. It is an interesting coincidence that all of them are in Voždovac municipality, on the so-called South-Eastern route of expansion of the city of Belgrade.
Bye bye 20th century, a paper for the Architecture and Ideology conference Belgrade, september 2012
| From a two decades time distance the face of almost every former Yugoslav city appears to reveal three distinctive urban entities: they show three different faces: the »brave new city« of the socialist era; the »charming, always regenerating old, classical city« and the brutal, illegal, »under the carpet« city. All of them are results of the city management streams and the power relationships in the carefully constructed appearance of the »socialist urban planning«. The city structure comparison of five ex Yugoslav cities -Belgrade, Sarajevo, Split, Priština and Maribor -shows similarities that are almost intentional. The urban planning attitude throughout the history reveals three powerful ways of thinking and acting that generated three city planning principles and resulted in built zones and structures: the developments of the functional city parts, the preservation of historical structures and the permissive, half illegal city extensions. After comparing these five cities today it only seems that the permissive, half illegal current is prevailing in the last twenty years of city development. Since the main urban development themes are not actual anymore, the former positions of the urban planners and architects are outdated; with the dissolution of the brave 20th century ideas the first decade of our century shows that the urban perception is altered -the positions of urban planning on the other side are mainly defended as unchangeable. To develop the ex Yugoslav cities with similar urban history there are two statements an urban planner of the 21st century has to take into consideration. The first is that the 20th century is over and its city development principles are outdated. The second painful statement is that the position of the urban planner and designer has been irreversibly changed.
Building New Belgrade for Tito's Yugoslavia (PREVIEW)
2017
This thesis looks at the construction of New Belgrade as an urban history narrative for the history of Yugoslavia. This is a study of the history of place and space, in conjunction with the history of Tito's Yugoslavia. Beginning with the foundation for the new city, during the interwar period, the first chapter establishes an understanding of the purpose of the place during the Kingdom era. It then looks at the effect of the Second World War, and the establishment of the communist/socialist era under Josip Broz Tito. The following chapter looks at the Tito era from the split from the Cominform. It is an analysis of the creation of New Belgrade under Tito, and how it is representative of Yugoslavia’s differentiation from the Soviet Bloc. The final chapter examines New Belgrade following the Tito era, the impact of the collapse of Yugoslavia, NATO intervention and the rebuilding of New Belgrade in the 21st century. NOTE: This is only a preview. Full thesis is available on my profile.
MÖGG, 2020
The urban transformations taking place throughout the region of former Yugoslavia are best exemplified in the capitals of the once-communist federation’s successor states. The recent urban developments in the cities of Belgrade, Zagreb, and Sarajevo illustrate the realities of contemporary societies in the Balkans and the socio-political shifts of the pe- riod of transition. The built environments of the newly capitalist countries serve as exag- gerated, yet emblematic examples of nation-building projects and their deep entwinement with economic processes unfolding throughout post-communist South-Eastern Europe. However, the links between the post-socialist urban and national identity, as well as poli- tics and economy, remain understudied. In this paper, I enquire into the present-day urban transformations of Sarajevo, Bel- grade, and Zagreb. I examine these cities within the context of post-Yugoslav economic and political space, exploring the particularities of the creation of built environments that no longer exist on the Yugoslav periphery, but now are at the centre of newly democratic societies. Through the investigation of the political, economic, and architectural particularities of Belgrade Waterfront and Zagreb Manhattan development projects, and Sarajevovo City Center commercial complex, I examine the influx of foreign funds – mainly from the Middle East – and their impacts on the construction of regional urban centres. I argue that the modern-day capitals of post-Yugoslav states are developing as products of the interpolation of a communist past into the capitalist present characterised by the perpetual quest for “Europe”, and in line with the broader socio-political and architectural trends in Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. In post-Yugoslavia, urban practices are problematically interwoven with politics: the cities simultaneously serve as displays of geopolitical change and catalysts for social transformation in post-socialist societies. Keywords: Post-socialist city, urban transformations, Balkans, nationalism, Yugoslavia, Belgrade, Zagreb, Sarajevo
Urban Patterns of Housing in Post‐Socialist Serbia: Between Planning, Law and Reality
2016
Housing has always been considered to be a very complex urban function, where the social aspect of private-life sensitivity confronts the economic fact of every housing unit as a commodity. This confrontation is even more significant if it is known that housing is also the spatially most demanding urban function, usually exceeding city limits and tackling both the urban and regional level. Thus, every society tries to make a balance of these aspects of housing through various measures in legislation, planning and property management. But, what happens when this balance stops working? A good example is present-day Serbia, as a typical post-socialist country with many unexpected and sudden “transitional” changes. The consequences are fragile and underdeveloped legislative, planning and strategic systems in Serbia, which are the important culprits for the present state in housing. For example, the main legislative act, the national law on housing is very old for transitional circumstan...
New Belgrade: from abstract to personal
2016
El articulo forma parte de la investigacion doctoral de la autora, desarrollada entre 2001 y 2006 en la Universidad Politecnica de Cataluna, en Barcelona, con el titulo “Arquitectura, ideologia y representacion. Analisis de los proyectos de Nueva Belgrado 1947-1959. Trata la cuestion del papel de los proyectos arquitectonicos en el contexto del cambio de ideologias, como un medio de comprender las complejas relaciones entre la arquitectura, el discurso dominante las estructuras de poder y las consecuencias sociales de las intervenciones urbanas a gran escala. La investigacion se centra en las diferentes fases del desarrollo de la parte central, e inicialmente mas representativa de Nueva Belgrado, la pretendida nueva capital de la recien creada Yugoslavia socialista, concluyendo con los cambios de los primeros 2000 que pusieron el acento en los valores de la nueva ciudad, asi como en las debilidades del concepto modernista en el contexto socialista, el cual fue su base original. Como...