Prostoria and Architecture
Rarely is modernism so deeply inscribed into an urban identity as it is in Croatia’s capital, Zagreb, the city that shaped Prostoria’s origins. While in many contexts modernism was contested after the mid-20th century and later rediscovered, here it has remained a continuous and unquestioned cultural foundation. This continuity has recently been internationally reaffirmed as well - the global recognition of Zagreb and Yugoslav modernism, exemplified by exhibitions such as Toward a Concrete Utopia at New York’s MoMA, is grounded in genuine architectural and design achievements rather than mere nostalgia.
When we speak of modernism, we do not mean a style, but an attitude. A set of values rooted in rationality, openness, non-dogmatism, and a spirit of inquiry - values that are as aesthetic as they are ethical. It was on this foundation that, during the 1950s and 1960s in Zagreb, the idea of the inseparability of architecture, design, and art matured. Architecture and design were not simply a backdrop to everyday life, but active participants in social progress.
It is within this context that the encounter between Zagreb’s modernist architecture and Prostoria’s contemporary furniture takes place. Monumental public buildings from that era become a stage on which contemporary objects integrate naturally, communicating with the space through a shared language of clarity, economy of expression, and confidence. Although more than half a century separates them, architecture and design here do not appear as a quotation or a return, but as a continuation of exploration.
Today, as the focus of spatial transformation increasingly shifts from grand public gestures to interiors and objects, the small scale becomes a site of experimentation. The natural affinity between Prostoria’s products and modernist architecture points to shared value origins—the belief that design emerges at the intersection of ethics and aesthetics, and that it carries a broader social meaning.
Prostoria’s products are neither nostalgic nor regionally confined. Their ambitions, authors, and reach are global, yet their value base remains clearly rooted. Just as the architecture of mid-20th-century public institutions helped shape a more open and modern Zagreb, Prostoria today acts as a platform that enables designers to work in continuity with those ideas—creating furniture grounded in clear, enduring, and relevant values.
Maroje Mrduljaš, architecture theorist
The text is a condensed version of the article published in the Prostoria 10 publication.
