Scholarly record

"PROBLEMATIC" CULTURAL HERITAGE. IS IT WORTH TO PROTECT TRADITIONAL WOODEN BUILDING IN CITIES?

A. Gajdek

Abstract

The aim of the research was to indicate the characteristics of traditional wooden buildings, determining its multi-faceted value and the role it plays in the contemporary structure of the city, on the example of RzeszГіw (south-eastern part of Poland). The research methodology included field work and analysis of the city plan that is identification of existing traditional wooden residential buildings. A query was made of archival materials and studies on conservation documentation regarding the studied objects in the context of contemporary ideas of the development of RzeszГіw promoted as the "capital of innovation". The collected materials indicate a significant saturation of the urban spatial structure with wooden cultural monuments. An extensive collection of wooden residential buildings from the late nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century allows to reconstruct the view of villages adjacent to RzeszГіw systematically incorporated into the urban organism. It is also a source of inspiration regarding the method of shaping proportions, forms and details of buildings, in line with the cultural tradition of this area. At the same time, a dynamically developing city aspiring to become an innovation center, pursues an intense investment policy, focused on the implementation of modern architecture and the smart city idea (including an integrated public transport system). The author of the article is looking for a substantive and practical justification for the need to protect wooden residential buildings in a modern city. Lack of proper actions in the field of conservation of these buildings but also of social education causes that they undergo strong transformations and sometimes demolition. The relics of past, centuries-old building traditions consistent with local cultural and natural conditions, irretrievably disappear from the Polish landscape, however, the research indicates their significant architectural and urban potential.

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