Stavoprojekt 1948 – 1953 / Practice
Stavoprojekt was established in September 1948, as a state design institute and a result of the dramatic political and social changes taking place at the time, but also against the backdrop of the long-standing concentrated efforts of a left-wing avant-garde. As a part of the Czechoslovak Construction Works (ČSSZ), the collectivised construction companies, the new state design organisation was to help turn architecture over to the planned economy and construction. In its original centralised form as a national enterprise, with headquarters in Prague and regional or specialised centres, Stavoprojekt existed until 1953, when it was divided into smaller design institutions. It is precisely to this first formative phase of state design practice in the years 1948–1953 that this book and the research project Stavoprojekt 1948–1953 conducted under the NAKI III programme of the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic (DH23P03OVV004) are devoted.
The book was created as a critical catalogue of the exhibition. It consists of two parts. The first anchors the events in the political and social context, maps the legislative frameworks and the actual operation and working conditions within the technocratically controlled state design institution. The second part follows selected characteristic areas of Stavoprojekt’s activity – from large-scale rural and landscape, through heritage conservation, public buildings, industry, to new socialist cities and housing. The selection of the observed contemporary challenges conveys the political-ideological or economic priorities and its aim is mainly to present the crucial phenomena of the first five-year plan – the typification and industrialisation of the construction industry – to which nearly all activities were subordinated in the interests of post-war economic recovery, satisfying the demand for goods, energy and housing, or in the interests of building a socialist society, precisely remit of Stavoprojekt.
© editors Petr Vorlík, Šárka Steinová
© texts Klára Brůhová, Slavomíra Ferenčuhová, Hubert Guzik, Michal Kurz, Miroslav Pavel, Lucie Skřivánková, Matěj Spurný, Šárka Steinová, Martin Strakoš, Lucia Tóthová, Klára Ullmannová, Lukáš Veverka, Veronika Vicherková, Petr Vorlík, Jan Zikmund
© translation Robin Cassling, Darren Crown
© graphic design, production, visuality Gabriel Fragner, Barbora Kočí, Jiří Klíma, Jan Forejt (Studio Formall)
© peer review Radomíra Sedláková, Eva Špačková
© 2026 CTU Prague, Faculty of Architecture
ISBN 978‑80‑01‑07438‑1
