100 years of Func­tion­alism in the Czech Republic – the Ensemble Legacy

The higher you go, the clearer the urba­ni­sation of Zlín becomes, and it doesn’t get any higher than this. Dr Zdeněk Pokluda and I are standing on what was once the tallest building in what was then Cze­chos­lo­vakia. The Admi­nis­tration Building No. 21, also known as the Bata sky­scraper, was built here between 1936 and 1939 and was one of the first high-rise buil­dings in Europe. The his­torian Pokluda worked for many years as Director of the State Dis­trict Archive in Zlín and rese­arches the Czech eco­nomic history of the 19th and 20th cen­turies. He spe­cia­lises in the Bata company, which rose to become the largest shoe company in the world in the first decades of the 20th century and whose dominant market position is closely linked to the busi­nessman and indus­trialist, Tomáš Bat’a [Tomas Bata].

Pokluda describes Bata as a “self-made man, as his name is almost sym­bolic.” This is because Bata gave Zlín “the repu­tation of a city of gardens and modern archi­tecture, the face of which it has retained to this day.”

From the roof terrace of high-rise building no. 21, the native of Zlín explains this func­tion­alist appearance, which is only 100 kilo­metres away from Brno, the other important site of Czech Func­tion­alism. He points out the stringent structure of the factory complex with the num­bering visible from afar, the workers’ housing estates and the solitary buil­dings such as the market hall, the multi-storey department stores, the large cinema and the halls of resi­dence. Another striking feature is the topo­graphy of the city with its hills and the elon­gated depression, inter­sected by multi-lane roads. Seen from above, the streets Gahurova and No. 49 or Tomáše Bati Road run through the town like logical, linear solu­tions. This makes them an ideal match for Bata’s indus­trial brick archi­tecture. Serial effi­ciency and growth-ori­en­tated pro­duc­tivity were dove­tailed in the manu­fac­turing pro­cesses as well as in the con­s­truction of the fac­tories.

The Tomas Bata story begins in 1894, when he founded a shoe­making workshop with his siblings Antonin and Anna. He later managed the business alone and built it up into a shoe empire, which even­tually became a con­glo­merate with che­mical, food and textile pro­duction, as well as a rubber and paper manu­fac­turing division. At its peak in the 1920s and 1930s, the company employed over 60,000 people worldwide.

The unren­dered brickwork with large, divided windows became the hallmark of the uniform appearance of Bata archi­tecture in Zlín. The stan­dar­dised indus­trial buil­dings were laid out in a chess­board pattern, grouped into larger ensembles and con­nected to each other via transport systems. Stan­dar­di­s­ation reduced costs while at the same time speeding up con­s­truction times. Several archi­tects were involved in the deve­lo­pment, including Jan Kotěra (1871–1923), Fran­tišek Lydie Gahura (1891–1958) and Vla­dimír Karfík (1901–1996). All three sym­bolise the dif­ferent phases of the Bata era. Kotěra, a student of Otto Wagner from Brno, designed the first housing estates and as a uni­versity teacher, he influenced the next gene­ration of Czech archi­tects, for example when he taught Bohuslav Fuchs.

The tower block designed by Karfík is one of the most important works of Czech Modernism. With its height of 77 metres, it was the tallest building in the country for a long time. As with the pro­duction buil­dings, it is based on the same modular system of 6.15 metres x 6.15 metres. The sup­porting structure is made of rein­forced con­crete, the outer wall con­sists of the cha­rac­te­ristic divided windows and brick infill. The Bata Works admi­nis­tration building sur­vived the Second World War uns­cathed. It was reno­vated in 2004 and is now the seat of the Zlín Regional Finance and Dis­trict Office.

This change of use also sym­bo­lises the trans­for­mation not only of the Bata site, but of the entire city. After the Second World War, the new com­munist rulers por­trayed the Bata family as exploiters and enemies of the people. The suc­cessor company went bankrupt. The Bata heirs in Canada, on the other hand, were suc­cessful with their new start. Today, Bata is a cor­po­ration with 30,000 employees based in Lau­sanne, Switz­erland.

Zlín today lives and works with the Bata gene. Those respon­sible are aware of the unique European heritage of the ensemble. At the same time, it is facing up to the new era, which appears to be an ellip­tical glass-and-metal century in the form of the Culture and Uni­versity Centre (KUC), designed by Eva Jiřičná (b.1939). Born in Zlín, the award-winning architect lives and works in London. She returned to her native city for the KUC and created two large, ellip­tical bodies that tog­ether form a V, making the fore­court an inviting gesture towards the Bata area. Another feature is the thorn-like roof crown of the cul­tural centre and the glass screens on the facade.

These shapes and mate­rials: was there any con­tro­versy in the city? “No, not at all,” says Pokluda, the Bata and Zlín expert. “It was dis­cussed, but people realise that they can’t shut them­selves off from the new era.”

He talks about the migration of young people to Prague, the struc­tural change in the region and how to deal with the func­tion­alist heritage – in a con­tem­porary way and with respect for the Bata era. It is fitting that a school, designed by Gahura, stood on the same site, also with several buil­dings that form a fore­court opening onto the city. A city could not face its func­tion­alist heritage in a more con­sidered and con­tem­porary way.

Text / Photos: Jan Dimog

Note:
Hej rup (Let’s go), a survey exhi­bition on the Czech avant-garde movement, can be seen at the Bröhan Museum in Berlin until March 3, 2024. An exquisite show, as Oliver G. Hamm judges in Bauwelt 3/2024. Our author also highly recom­mends a visit!