Your design for a modern apartment building in Lodecká Street in the centre of Prague won you the National Award for Architecture in 2011. What do you think about the opinions that claim that Prague is an open-air museum and that modern architecture cannot be built there?
I pretty much share that view. We’ve managed to build a system of an infinite number of obstacles. The more daring plans need a huge amount of energy to push them through, in addition to a huge amount of luck to see them through to fruition. Architects and investors know this. The result is that everyone is up against the wall. But we’re here to do something about it.
How cities and buildings should respond to the needs of modern society. What role does public space play here?
Public space is experiencing a renaissance. I think in the last decade at least in their heads. And in some places, even in realisations, cars are starting to clear the space long occupied by pedestrians and cyclists. We are at the beginning of the process of giving cities back to the people.
What do you think Czech architecture lacks and what does Prague in particular lack the most?
The courage to make decisions. It is better to build and maybe make mistakes than not to build. Prague is lacking withthe power and authority to get things done – local government reform. The city is so fragmented and has such complex internal processes that they are a brutal obstacle to development
Peter, you have a varied collection of completed projects under your belt. But is there a typology you’d like to try?
A good advice is: don’t make your wishes public, they may come true 😊 But for example: a home for the elderly – mixed with a kindergarten. Two nicely complementary typologies.
Which of the prejudices that circulate about architects do you find wrong?
We are not dreamers of grand visions divorced from reality. An architect must know life and its typology and needs like no other profession. It is a service to people, not to the ego.
