Small interventions, big results. Tiny architecture does not mean tiny effort. On the contrary, it often hides heart‑breaking stories, years of relentless activity by local initiatives, or incremental catharses. A bus stop shelter can be a window to a village’s soul, a footbridge can improve access to a water fountain on a spa’s walking trail. A tiny belfry can protect a whole mountain range from destruction by coal mining. A lookout can be just six meters tall. A family shrine can pay homage to a builder’s grandfather and also offer a tranquil resting place for cyclists and walkers coming from afar.

Since around 2009, when the joint efforts of mayor Věslav Michalik and municipal architect Anna Šlapetová started to bear fruit, Dolní Břežany has been considered a trendsetter in commissioning contemporary architecture. In 2020, the list of remarkable local projects expanded once again with the completion of the town’s new preschool. On its own, the need for having two preschool buildings of three classrooms each to satisfy the demand of the younger-than-average population, speaks volumes. The new building allowed the current tenants of the school, in their less than suitable temporary facility, to relocate after 11 years. The main corridor and all the service and storage rooms face the access road, while the three classroom sections jut out southeast, into the garden, with rising roofs and a glass wall with a covered deck at the end. A yellow, orange, and red color scheme, used both on the outside and on the inside, sets the three sections apart.

After two serious topics we have decided to give you some lighter reading for the summer, presenting small structures of different types and places. The issue can serve as a vacation travel-guide, if and when we start travelling again, instead of vacationing each weekend at our cabins.

One of the most tragic things that can happen to a parent is losing their beloved child. It’s never easy to talk about the death of a child. Help and support for families where the children suffer a serious illness is insufficient in Czechia. The proposed children’s hospice House for Julie in Brno is hoping to change that. We spoke with the hospice director Radka Vernerová and the project architects studio Čtyřstěn.

Professing its affinity with city block urbanism, the student housing project in Prague Holešovice closely follows the building line while adding generous new public ground-floor spaces facing the tree-lined sidewalk. This was how a typical sort of development in Old Holešovice once looked. But it’s barely noticeable now, with only a few scattered buildings from the turn of the 20th century left. Grandiose socialist transport infrastructure projects severely damaged the urban character. The ambition behind the new student housing was to revive the long lost atmosphere, strengthen the street network, and thus make one of the first steps towards a vibrant future city neighborhood.