Krzysztof Bizio

The subject of this article is an attempt to reflect upon active elevations’ solutions used in modern architecture and the consequences for form and function of a building. The process of changing the importance in modern, postmodern and contemporary architecture was analysed in historical perspective. In this article the author elaborates chosen examples that are connected with using solutions such as curtain- and two–layered walls, glass elevations’ ornamentation, controlled access to daylight, tensile structures and membranes, interactive illuminations and their connection with vegetation. The last segment contains the summarized reflection on this matter.

The article is the second part of a study on the origins and forms of development of recreational areas in the composition of modernist housing estates. The first part discusses the development of residential environment before the World War II, distinguishing five types of composition of recreational areas. The second part discusses the development of modernism and movements contesting it after World War II, distinguishing additional eight types of composition (six types of modernist composition and two types of composition contesting modernism but remaining in a direct relationship with them).
As type 6 are distinguished modernist units formed in the centers of European cities, in the areas destroyed during World War II. These compositions were mostly in counterpoint to the pre-existing compact developments, promoting open recreational areas. A type 7 is social realist composition, which created in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, constituted temporary deviation from modernist ideas, although in subsequent years some of them has been developed in accordance with the modernist schemes. Type 8 are the most numerous and most typical for post-war modernism satellite settlements arisen from the 50s to the 80s of the twentieth century. Type 9 are settlements derived from the concept of linear and structural compositions. Type 10 are the units of late modernism, which frequently in the form of manifests argued for a radical combination of architecture and natural areas. Type 11 is a postmodernist urbanism that had modernism context, but in some schemes also alluded to it. Type 12 is a neomodern urbanism formed at the turn of the twentieth and twenty-first century, seeking inspiration in the broadly understood achievements of twentieth-century modernism.
In the summary are described the main development trends of the analyzed phenomenon.

This paper attempts to systematise the manner in which avant-garde architecture employed regional motifs during the first two decades of the twenty-first century. Architecture has used local patterns since its beginnings. However, as soon as the models of architectural orders had become widespread in the modern era, folk architecture and inspirations drawn from regional traditions were marginalised. Post-modern architecture questioned the ideas of universal practices, giving prominence to regional architecture. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, avant-garde architecture once more redefined the employment of local traditions as inspirations. The paper seeks to systematise the modern references to local traditions, distinguishing three basic categories: a) inspirations by architectural form, b) inspirations by construction materials and craft, c) inspirations by the ’idea of community‘. The selected examples are representative of these modern architectural solutions, and are discussed in connection to earlier projects.

The subject of the paper is the study of multifamily residential architecture, which was developed after 1989 and is directly related to the urbanization processes in the Szczecin agglomeration. Selected and representative examples were analyzed in terms of their characteristics of urban composition. The article describes the consecutive stages of development of the Szczecin agglomeration from the end of the 19th century to the present day in the context of changes in the shapes of multifamily residential architecture, emerging in suburban areas. For the purposes of the paper, typology of solutions was introduced based on the size and type of composition. Difficulties of creating new residential architecture in the areas of former villages, adaptations and extensions of former complexes of land estates and industrial complexes were discussed. The impact of the forms of investment processes on the shape of spatial solutions is also discussed, as well as the prospects for further development.

The political and economic changes that occurred in 1989 in Poland have influenced the development of recreational ar­chitecture and facilities. The transformations that took place within the field of the architecture of recreational residence buildings located in the seaside region of Western Pomerania exemplify these shifts. For nearly thirty years, one has been able to observe the progressing urbanisation of areas that were recently used for agriculture and forestry. These phenomena belong to a broader spectrum of civilisational changes that influence the relationship between seaside areas and the people who live in them.

The subject of the article is the description of the genesis and directions of development of recreational areas in the urban composition of modernist housing complexes befor World War II. As the starting point was chosen the criticism of the stone city which has been described, among others, by Werner Hegemann. Further development of residential urban planning was analyzed in the perspective of created alternatives, integrating housing and recreational areas.
For the analysis there have been distinguished 5 types of urban composition and methods of the presence of recreational areas inside them. As a type 1 they tested luxurious villa districts of the late nineteenth century, which were designed on the suburbs of cities. Although these assumptions did not have the modernist character, they announced a wider integration of recreational areas and residential architecture. As type 2 they defined the birth and the development of idea of garden city. Howard’s concept has become the basis for broader social movements. They acted in the development of health and hygiene issues, education of youth, popularization of sports, or new ways of spending free time in broader social reform. As a type 3 they analyzed the recomposition of quarter building estates, in particular its solutions from the beginning of modernism. As a type 4 they described the development of banded and detached systems, emphasizing the presence of various forms of recreation areas. As the last 5 type of composition, that has not been widely used before World War II, they defined radical ideas most fully represented by Le Corbusier. Created by him analysis and projects that he described, among others, in Urbanism, found a response and were developed by the most avant-garde artists and constituted extreme form of the evolution of ideological assumptions of the late nineteenth and
early twentieth century.
In conclusion the article emphasize that analyzed solutions constituted a testing ground of new urbanism experience, in which the role of ideological manifesto was played by recreational areas. The amount of the formal experience in this phase of modernism, individualism and especially the friendly scale of solutions influenced in most cases their contemporary positive perception.

The subject of the article is to discuss the role of manifestos, books and other publications in the creation of the radical architectural vision of the nineteenth century and the beginnings of modernism in the twentieth century. T he theoretical basis of avant-garde architecture, which in time became mass architecture, was developed in the main part by theorists. During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the nature of architectural manifestos has changed, and deviated from the formal description of ordinal architectural solutions towards promoting the idea of cities of the future associated with social issues. P articularly noteworthy is the increase in the importance of schematic idea diagrams and constant radicalization of the vision.

The subject of this article is an analysis of selected examples of the modernist housing architecture, in which influences and inspirations resulting from the intention to incorporate the means of operating the sunlight can be observed. Analyses were performed with reference to urban and architectural solutions. Ensuring proper lighting conditions, in addition to the necessity of creating suitable ventilation conditions, the accessibility of recreational areas and other hygiene-sanitary conditions, has become one of the foundations of modernist movement at the beginning of 20th century. The article discusses the following forms of urban planning (new type of compact quarter, linear compositions, detached and tower block settings) - from the perspective of access to sunlight. According to the architectural solutions (depending on different approaches toward incorporating sunlight) the article discusses miscellaneous examples across Europe – north, where the demand for it is particularly high, and southern efforts nurturing partial shading in their designs. The final part of the article examines contemporary trends in the architecture of modernism, where the use of sunlight is also an inspiration for architectural solutions.