The Influence of Architectural Practice in Poland on Cultural Heritage – Selected Problems

Abstract

The condition of architect’s profession in Poland has changed significantly in the last thirty years. It doesn’t mean that important progress can be observed in every part of this specific job nowadays. Of course, there are many advantages of a political transformation, which were in place in this country starting from the year of 1989. The economic situation of architects today differs very much from the past. Meanwhile, alarming things have occurred in many examples of adaptive re-use of old building and gentrification of historical areas. The purpose of the research was to recognize reasons of controversial actions in the field of architectural design related to conservation issues. The main aim of the article is to outline a few problems of contemporary practice, which have impact not only on modern, but also on historical architecture. Among others, principle results are mentioned in the next couple of sentences. Very significant are contracts. In many times, there is a lack of proper balance between an investor and an architectural studio. It concerns primarily the part of the designing process. The essential chapters of contracts have some information about remuneration for services, usually quite low, and punishments for delays and withdrawals from the contract. In practice, the position of architects in Poland is very weak. The other problem is law regulations that seems to be rather inadequate to reality in the area of historical buildings’ preservation. Another issue is the fact that a designer has often no relevant knowledge, experience and interest in the field of tangible cultural heritage. Also, the architectural organisations, operating in Poland, seems to act not strong enough in discussed topics. There are many things to do in the matter of public orders, workshops, interventions and others. The discussion and conclusions include proposal of ways of changing the situation. Some of them have begun already, others can be improved. The content of the paper may help to understand why economic growth can be a negative factor in preventing ancient buildings from damage. Values of heritage are part of the basis of architectural design. Combining them with modern needs to find the best solution is difficult, even for professionals, but can be conducted properly, due to continuous development of theoretical findings.