I’ve just returned from four days in Plzen, a small city set on several rivers in Bohemia, in the west of the Czech Republic. I was there with a group of local and international ‘bakers’, at the invitation of the British Council, who are supporting the city to consider how public space could be opened up and utilised for a range of cultural and artistic practices, for the development of social and economic possibilities for the citizens. Stef, also from the UK, built a Posterous site from the first kick off to log some thoughts and perceptions, well worth a dip into.
I have never had the fortune to travel to the Czech Republic- I remember the splitting apart of Czechoslovakia, and I’ve family members who have made several trips to Prague, always returning to speak of the architectural wonders, the artistic splendour, and the friendliness of local people. So I travelled with some considerable expectation- not to find a minature Prague, but buoyed by a sense of possible welcome, plus a chance to talk with a group of architects, activists and designers about how to turn around some underused space.
The city is not Prague. Being only around 60km or so away, it does feel a little like it falls under the shadow of it’s bigger sibling. It is highly historic- with an old centre encircled with factories, shops and houses, and sits on several rivers which join in the city to become one. It’s most famous exports are its incredible pilsner lager- which gives its name to all pilsner lagers of the world, and the activity of Skoda, both the car maker and parts maker. I arrived on a balmy Saturday night, and was launched straight into a wonderful perambulating population who were celebrating Mercuri day- where streets in the centre are closed to traffic and there’s music, performance, dance, food and celebration. With local and international bakers, we set off into the dizzying throng, to see the best of Plzen culture.
The experience stays with you as you ease into the process of group work with the bakery, which seeks to define need, post solutions and draw up action plans and business cases to put to the city authorities, sponsors and stakeholders. Overarching the whole process is the passionate desire from the city to be better known for the depth of its culture beyond popular conceptions as the birthplace of the worlds best lager. It is in the running as a candidate for the 2015 European Capital of Culture. As bakers, set to bake ingredients of resource together, this was clearly a primary goal. But in the days that unfolded, you became less dogmatic about this date, and just ready to add your own enthusiasm to help reimagine some wonderful, eccentric and historic spaces so communities could better use them.
My own bakery group focused on a patch of unused, unloved park sandwiched between a huge bus station, a technical art college and factory buildings. Faded yellow grass, a forgotten air and invisibility to travellers had rendered this park into a neglected zone where no-one thought to rest. We used a variety of design approaches and user consultations (data visualisations, modelling materials, aerial maps, chalk and tape on city streets) to take the pulse of potential users for a ‘design park’, with kino (cinema) bus, outlet for creative works from nearby studios, a canvas for their work, plus adjacent items of better furniture, lighting, refreshment, safety and wifi. Everything just flowed so well together it was a pleasure to learn from local bakers about all those incidental areas that impact on your planning and development: what the schools system was like, what politics was like, who movers and shakers were, what perceptions there were of design, what they thought of themselves, and how they were perceived by others. In the end, it’s largely about advocacy rather than town planning and architecture- it’s the social shift that needs to happen at the root of it all.
For me, making new friends from the UK, Poland, Hungary, Estonia, Belarus, and other places, plus the wonderful warmth and hospitality of our Czech hosts, will stay with me for some time, as a contrast and counterpoint to the pressure cooker of performance and ego that sometimes characterises these exercises here in the UK. It was structured but flexible, serious but fun, and by balancing the parts so well, I feel it served the city very well and boosts the chances of this wonderful small city becoming 2015 European Capital of Culture.
