With the industrialization of architecture, increasingly more residential and public buildings were constructed according to standardized designs and from prefabricated reinforced concrete components (schools, including nurseries and technical schools, cultural halls, cinemas, retail stores and shopping centers), but administrative facilities for the most important government offices and cultural institutions continued to be treated as unique structures calling for custom designs. This trend was reinforced by the emergence in the 1960s of new functional types of public buildings.
Symbolically, one of the first buildings to signal the modernization of architecture was dedicated to architecture itself: the Urban Construction Design Institute (UCDI, with architecture overseen by Eduardas Chlomauskas and engineering by Česlovas Gerliakas in 1961) was the first building in the Soviet Union to be specifically constructed for an urban planning institute. The building was unique in its innovations, both functional and architectural, and featured numerous evident influences from the modernism of inter-war Lithuanian architecture: symmetrical composition, accentuated cornices, an even facade, lateral avants-corps and symmetrical courtyard wings as well as a functional roof over the main entry staircase. The vestibule was also modern, featuring an original semicylindrical, spiraling main staircase surrounded by glass brick that allowed in light, with wooden finishing, original light fixtures, and a “green corner” for plants.
Another modern “office building” arose in Kaunas. The Industrial Construction Design Institute (or “Pramprojektas” for short), designed by Vladas Stauskas and Algimantas Sprindys and constructed in 1959–1965, was the most significant early postwar modernist building in Kaunas from a symbolic perspective, since its design also sought to preserve a connection to the city’s pre-war architecture. Architects attempted to integrate the volume of the new building and the surrounding sloping landscape and existing buildings such as the Resurrection Church (converted into a radio parts factory by the Soviet regime) and the Kaunas War Museum into one homogenous composition. The new structure was also one of the first high-rise buildings to be built in the center of Kaunas.
The most popular application of high-rise construction in the 1960s, however, was in hotel architecture. The period could easily be called a “hotel boom,” the result of an increase in tourism throughout the Soviet Union and the gradual opening of external borders. It had become important to greet foreign tourists visiting the country with a modern face.
The hotel construction process was overseen by the Soviet foreign tourism organization “Intourist,” which commissioned new hotels in the capitals of the constituent Soviet republics based on contemporary Western examples, such as the Radisson SAS hotel in Copenhagen, designed by Arne Jacobsen in 1958 and completed in 1960. The design, consisting of a long horizontal base structure housing the main lobby and a second story reserved for service staff, and a vertical central structure of 15-25 stories with ample windows for guest rooms, became particularly popular in the Socialist Bloc cities. The first examples of this style in Vilnius were the Draugystė (Friendship) Hotel (design by Stasys Bareikis, 1970) and the new Intourist Lietuva (Lithuania) Hotel, begun in 1964 based on designs by the brother architects Algimantas and Vytautas Nasvytis, but completed only in 1984.
Another type of modern hotel consisted of an elongated, horizontal box design based on a prototype considered particularly modern at the time, the Yunost Hotel in Moscow, completed in 1961 and designed by Yuri Arndt. The first Intourist hotels of this type were built near the main railroad stations in Vilnius (“Gintaras” - Amber, by Stasys Bareikis, in 1964) and Kaunas (“Baltija” - Baltic, designed by Jonas Navakas, completed in 1966). The modernization of the Neringa Hotel and Café in Vilnius was also considered part of the boom of modern hotel construction.
The new modernist expression was also reflected in cultural buildings. One of the first of these structures was Statybininkų kultūros rūmai (the Construction Worker’s Culture Hall) in Vilnius, noted for its graceful, functionalist style. The young architect Algimantas Mačiulis openly espoused his desire to “approximate the aesthetics of Bauhaus functionalism,” Algimantas Mačiulis, Permainingi metai. Architekto užrašai, Vilnius: Vilniaus dailės akademijos leidykla, 2008, p. 173. considered important by a new generation of architects who sought to liberate their discipline from Stalinist regulation. The design’s large glass, cube-shaped structure elevated on columns adhered to all of the canons of functionalism, and the 600-seat amphitheater hall with a modern stage and spacious lobby, lined on one side by an unbroken glass wall, gave the building a particularly contemporary appearance.
The introduction of architectural innovation was given particular impetus by an important anniversary in the Soviet historical calendar. The marking of the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution in 1967 encouraged numerous commemorative projects across the Soviet Union and helped accelerate the construction or completion of many new buildings. In Lithuania, for example, this meant the completion of the Art Exhibition Hall in 1967 (based on designs by Čekanauskas), one of the most prominent examples of early Lithuanian modernism, influenced by counterparts in Scandinavia and France and meant to blend harmoniously with the architecture of the surrounding Vilnius Old Town.
The construction of the Art Exhibition Hall was a reflection of a popular trend in the 1950s and 1960s to “enrich” historical urban quarters with modern architectural structures. This was also a view shared by modernist approaches to the Vilnius Old Town. Once cleared of the rubble from World War II, the future site of the Exhibition Hall had stood empty for a considerable time until the approaching anniversary of the October Revolution brought new funds and a directive to urgently complete the construction of a modern facility for the exhibition of art.
Despite its innovative shape, the structure has been incorporated into its historical surroundings with considerable sensitivity. On the northern side of Rotušės (Town Hall) Square, for example, architects “unveiled” views of the bell tower of Visų Šventųjų (All Saints’) Church. Standardized prefabricated and monolithic reinforced concrete panels used to construct the building were later masked with various decorative solutions. In 1969, the design for the Exhibition Hall was featured in the world-renowned magazine L‘Architecture d‘aujourd‘hui. The Hall and its café soon became a Soviet-era gathering place for “silent modernist” art and its creators.
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