Seismic Modernism

Tashkent, the southernmost metropolis of millions in the Soviet Union, is a city redolent with architectural contrasts and paradoxes. Home to the world’s most beautiful prefabricated buildings, it features a prominent urban duality predicated upon the oriental Old City and the Russian New City.

Never was this contrast brought into sharper focus than during the severe earthquake of 1966 which left the New City relatively unscathed but the Old City in ruins. Yet one respite was offered: a rebuilding effort which triggered an upsurge of innovation.

The city thus became the face of Seismic Modernism unprecedented in history, the earthquake stimulated the modernization of urban development in Tashkent. Architects incorporated regional building traditions in their socialist modern designs, including the visually intriguing facade mosaics attributed to the little-known Jarsky brothers.

The rebuilding of Tashkent provides a perfect example of Soviet ideas about urban planning in which technical standardization and social requirements were no more of a contradiction than the design of experimental living concepts and the simultaneous search for an expression of national identity in building. Tashkent thus represents a unique example of radical urban redevelopment in a Soviet megacity with standard designs.

Author Biography

Philipp Meuser, born in Hilden / Germany (1969), architect and publisher. Studied architecture in Berlin and Zürich with a focus on history and theory. Construction and consulting projects in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Academic research on mass housing in the Soviet Union as well as publications on socialist architecture.