Program Rethinking Industrial Sites took place as part of the Zagreb City Museum project entitled Zagreb Industrial Heritage: History, State of Affairs, Outlook (2009-2015), which focused on research, presentation and popularization of industrial heritage.
Program client: City of Zagreb, City Office for the Strategic Planning and Development of the City
Program implementer: Zagreb City Museum
Partner institutions:
University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Architecture
University of Novi Sad, Faculty of Technical Sciences
University of Sarajevo, Faculty of Architecture
University of Zagreb, Faculty of Architecture
Associate institution: City of Zagreb, City Institute for the Protection of Cultural and Natural Monuments
Coordinators of program implementation:
Goran Arčabić, Zagreb City Museum
Mirna Meštrović, City of Zagreb, City Office for the Strategic Planning and Development of the City
Period of program implementation: May 2014 – May 2015
Exhibition organisers:
City of Zagreb, City Office for the Strategic Planning and Development of the City
Zagreb City Museum
Exhibition curators: Goran Arčabić, Mirna Meštrović
Exhibition design: Mirna Horvat, Luka Juras
In May 2014, the City Office for Strategic Planning and Development, on behalf of the City of Zagreb, started to implement a one-year program called Rethinking Industrial Sites. Implementer of the program was the Zagreb City Museum and its partners were University of Sarajevo – Faculty of Architecture, University of Zagreb – Faculty of Architecture, University of Novi Sad – Faculty of Technical Sciences, Department of Architecture and Urban Planning and University of Ljubljana – Faculty of Architecture.
In the context of promoting the protection and reuse of industrial heritage, through the program Rethinking Industrial Sites the intention was to analyze the situation of the former Zagreb City’s slaughterhouse and cattle market as well as to present the possibilities of its transformation in partnership with educational institutions in the scientific field of architecture and urban planning research. Ideas arising from the program Rethinking Industrial Sites will serve as references and guidelines for future activities which are to be carried out by the City of Zagreb for the aforementioned complex.
The complex of the slaughterhouse and cattle market was one of the largest municipal investments between the two world wars. It was designed and built between 1928 and 1931 after the design of the Berlin architect Walter Frese, who specialized in the construction of industrial complexes of similar purposes. Complex of the City’s slaughterhouse and cattle market was protected in 1999. In 2004, the whole historic industrial complex had been established as a cultural good and is listed in the Register of Croatian Cultural Monuments (Z-1543).
The participation of partners in the program Rethinking Industrial Sites involved attendance of elective courses at four faculties in the winter semester of the academic year 2014/2015 during which the students, under the supervision of their mentors, in the form of group works created conceptual designs for the conversion of the complex of former City’s slaughterhouse and cattle market. They were guided by the instructions of the Zagreb City Office for Strategic Planning and Development. Upon completion of the winter semester works, which resulted from the simultaneous elective courses at four faculties, were rated by a committee comprised of the architects of various directions and representatives of the City of Zagreb. In the final stage of the program what followed was the award presentation and exhibition of works with the catalog.
Goran Arčabić
Work meeting of the client representatives and program implementers Rethinking Industrial Sites with the representatives of partners and collaborating institutions, 2 July 2014
Mentors and students of the four faculties in the professional guided tour of the complex of the City's slaughterhouse and cattle market prior to the commencement of the development works, 23 October 2014
Mentors and students of the four faculties in the professional guided tour of the complex of the City's slaughterhouse and cattle market prior to the commencement of the development works, 23 October 2014
Front of the City's slaughterhouse, 2012
Transient corridor between the two slaughterhouses, cold storage and meat market, 2012
Pigs slaughterhouse, 2012
The evaluation committee's work, March 2014
Pictures from the exhibition
photo Miljenko Gregl, ZCM
Exhibition catalogue
Rethinking Industrial Sites: professional and scientific analysis of the spatial possibilities for the former complex of the City’s slaughterhouse and cattle market in Zagreb / Editors Goran Arčabić and Mirna Meštrović.
Zagreb : Zagreb City Museum, City of Zagreb, City Office for the Strategic Planning and Development of the City, 2015