page_title: Architecture of Kosovo
section_title: Yugoslav period
hierarchical_section_title: Architecture of Kosovo / Yugoslav period
caption_attribution_description: Nederlands: Dit Joegoslavische 'Monument of Brotherhood and Unity' is echt wat je noemt een kunstwerk uit vervlogen tijden. De drie uiteinden staan voor de drie etnische groeperingen in Kosovo: Serven, Turken en Albanen.
context_page_description: The architecture of Kosovo dates back to the Neolithic period and includes the Copper, Bronze and Iron Ages, Antiquity and the Medieval period. It has been influenced by the presence of different civilizations and religions as evidenced by the structures which have survived to this day. Local builders have combined building techniques of conquering empires with the materials at hand and the existing conditions to develop their own varieties of dwellings.
  The monasteries and churches from the 14th century represent the Serbian Orthodox legacy. Architectural heritage from the Ottoman period includes mosques and hamams from the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries. Other historical architectural structures of interest include kullas from the 18th and 19th centuries as well as a number of bridges, urban centers and fortresses. While some vernacular buildings are not considered important in their own right, taken together they are of considerable interest. During the 1999 conflict in Kosovo many buildings that represent this heritage were destroyed or damaged. In the Dukagjini region, at least 500 kullas were attacked, and most of them destroyed or otherwise damaged.
context_section_description: In 1950, at the outset of Socialist Yugoslavia, the motto of the State as far as city planning was concerned was "Destroy the old, build the new". A 1959 book by the Municipal National Council of Prishtina called "Prishtina" shows the intentions of the regime at the time to lose the city's previous characteristics in the quest to give it more modern traits. The book boasts about 2200 newly built apartments, a number of health facilities, administrative buildings and schools, 130.000 square meters of new roads and pavements. According to this book, the new look of Prishtina was to be built on the ruins of the old city. New memorials were being erected and special care was being given to set new aesthetic foundations on the city.
  Immediately following the Second World War, Yugoslavia's brief association with the Eastern Bloc ushered in a short period of socialist realism. Centralization within the communist model led to the abolishment of private architectural practices and the state control of the profession. During this period, the governing Communist Party condemned modernism as "bourgeois formalism," a move that caused friction among the nation's pre-war modernist architectural elite.
  Socialist realist architecture in Yugoslavia came to an abrupt end with Josip Broz Tito's 1948 split with Stalin. In the following years the nation turned increasingly to the West, returning to the modernism that had characterized pre-war Yugoslav architecture. During this era, modernist architecture came to symbolize the nation's break from the USSR (a notion that later diminished with growing acceptability of modernism in the Eastern Bloc).
  The Yugoslav break from Soviet socialist realism combined with efforts to commemorate World War II, which together led to the creation of an immense quantity of abstract sculptural war memorials, known today as spomenik including the Monument of Brotherhood and Unity in Pristina's centre.
  In the late 1950s and early 1960s Brutalism began to garner a following within Yugoslavia, particularly among younger architects, a trend possibly influenced by the 1959 disbandment of the Congrès Internationaux d'Architecture Moderne.
  With 1950s decentralization and liberalization policies in SFR Yugoslavia, architecture became increasingly fractured along ethnic lines. Architects increasingly focused on building with reference to the architectural heritage of their individual socialist republics in the form of critical regionalism.
  The Hotel Union building is located in the center of Pristina. It is a three storey, L-shaped building of Austro-Hungarian architectural style with a surface of 500 square meters on the ground.
  It was designed by an Austrian architect and built in 1927 when it was used as a hotel. Because it is a distinguished example of that particular architectural style in Kosovo it was declared a protected cultural monument 1996. On August 22, 2009 the building caught on fire and sustained major damages.
  The building and the surrounding area went through a restoration Arassociati studio that made it functional again. Now it is operated by The United Colors of Benetton and is called Benetton Megastore in Pristina. The store was opened on September 9, 2013. The roof has remained its original form while the entrance has been given a new urban layout.
  The Palace of Youth and Sport, commonly called Boro-Ramizi, was built in 1977 with a surface of 8,136 square metres (87,580 sq ft) and was intended to be used for social, public, cultural and sport activities. The building caught fire in February 2000 due to an electrical malfunction. Now only the shopping center part of the building is functional.
caption: The Monument of Brotherhood and Unity in Pristina's centre
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