FEATURE
L JUBL JANA
DECEMBER-JANUARY 2012/13
WIZZ MAGAZINE
59
NATIVE SON
Words by Robin McKelvie
Ljubljana is often referred to as “the new Prague”,
but Slovene architect Joz
ˇ
e Plec
ˇ
nik is the man partly
responsible for their similar style. We examine the
postmodern pioneer’s stamp on his home city
O
ne of Europe’s great unsung architectural
heroes, Jozˇe Plecˇnik was a prolific and
brilliant talent who, in the 1920s and ’30s,
completely reinvented his home city of Ljubljana in
his own inimitable style. He was to Ljubljana what
Baron Haussmann was to Paris in the previous century.
Yet he also made his mark in Austria, in Graz and
Vienna, before going on to weave further architectural
miracles in Prague, to which Ljubljana is ironically
often compared.
Plecˇnik was born in 1872 in the Gradišcˇe district of
the Slovenian capital Ljubljana, then called Laibach
and part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. It was to
Austria he headed to develop the obvious flair for
architecture he had displayed throughout his early
years. Plecˇnik graduated in carpentry and furniture
design at secondary school in Graz before moving on in
the 1890s to the School of Architecture in the Austrian
capital, Vienna. This was to prove a seminal move as it
brought him under the wing of one of his design idols
and soon-to-be mentor, Otto Wagner.
After working on projects in Vienna (including the
Zacherl House, the Langer House and the Church of
the Holy Spirit) Plecˇnik turned his back on Austria
and pushed on to Prague in 1911. He taught at an
arts and crafts college in the city for the next decade,
influencing a generation of local architects and
designers. As his fame grew he was commissioned
directly by President Masaryk to renovate the
landmark Castle of Prague at Hradcˇany. In 1921, he
decided to move back to his native Ljubljana to take
on a new role as the head of architecture at the
fledgling Ljubljana University. The move also gave
Plecˇnik the opportunity to work on his grandest
designs yet, as ambitious as any undertaken in the
development of any modern European city, and
which would see the whole city revamped along his
ingenious blueprint.
PHOTOGRAPH: B.CVETKOVIC
