From prehistory to the Byzantine Empire
The site of Runik shelters the astonishing vestiges of a Neolithic habitat composed of huts reinforced by wooden beams. A use of natural materials that is found in the Bronze Age where the adobe houses are covered with a roof made of wood and twigs. It was during this period that imposing fortresses appeared, always built on high ground and taking advantage of the rugged terrain and nature. It is the case of the fortresses of Gradishta and Korishë. One of the most impressive is undoubtedly that of Bellaçec, of trapezoidal form and protected by trenches and rows of crosspieces made of ground and pebbles. Illyrians and Dardanians continue this defensive architecture by erecting new fortresses, of often irregular form, like that of Keqekollë. But Illyrians will especially erect impressive necropolises gathering several tumuli (heap of earth or artificial stones) sheltering burials. The site of Gjinoc impresses by the dimensions of its tumulus, 84 m of diameter for nearly 10 m high; whereas the site of Boka-Përçeva, him, astonishes by the 19 tumuli which it gathers.
Illyrians are also known to have shown a genuine concern of the urbanism. The ancient city of Ulpiana is a good example. An urban scheme that the Romans developed with the help of a checkerboard layout, to which they added an ingenious system of canalisation. Another key site is the ancient mining town of Municipium Dardanorum with its imposing forum flanked by a row of columns, its platform supporting a temple, its thermal baths, but also the remains of its basilica, which served as a place to store ores, and its stone bridges and pillars, testifying to a consummate art of engineering. The site of Pestova, him, testifies to the splendor of the large villae rusticae organized around an atrium and whose various spaces are connected by broad corridors. But it is especially the Emperor Justinian, great figure of the Byzantine Empire, who marked Kosovo of his print. The latter imagined a powerful defensive system. The fortress of Harilaq, with its ramparts and circular walls of stone and brick; the reconstruction of the city of Ulpiana with its thick ramparts and semicircular towers; and the fortress of Podgrade with its pentagonal shape following the uneven topography of the site, its protective walls with corners flanked by towers and its imposing watchtower with a square plan, are fine examples of this architecture all in height, symmetry and massiveness. It is also from this period that the first paleochristian sites date, including the three-aisled church and the two circular buildings that make up a sacred complex within the fortress of Harilaq; and the foundations of the church and the semi-circular vaulted crypt-tomb of the village of Vrela.Medieval Kingdom of Serbia
The Serbs reused and reinforced pre-existing fortified sites, while creating new strategic positions. The fortress of Prizren, with its powerful walls with imposing arches, is one of the most famous. It will also inspire the fortress of Visegrad, whose ramparts and keep can be admired. Another important site is the fortress of Novo Brdo
, which boasts an amazingly regular hexagonal shape. Sheltered by its ramparts, its square towers and its impressive rectangular keep, a city divided into an upper and a lower town was developed, where buildings were erected that mixed Byzantine and Orthodox styles with Western influences, especially Romanesque. But this period is characterized above all by an unprecedented religious, cultural and artistic effervescence. Originally, Byzantine churches were characterized by a centered plan or a Greek cross plan (arms of the same length), an accumulation of vaults and domes and a great ornamental wealth (colored mosaics, frescoes, marble decorations, columns and stylized capitals, polychromy). Inspired by this Byzantine splendor, the Serbs will imagine a Serbo-Byzantine style with astonishing variations of which churches and monasteries are the most beautiful representatives. The monastery of Banjska shelters a church dedicated to Saint-Etienne which carries the mark of the school of La Rasca, with its single nave surmounted by a dome and its external sobriety contrasting with the richness of its frescos. The Serbian-Byzantine school itself is characterized by cruciform plans often inscribed in square plans, the multiplication of domes, the presence of a porch in the western facade, the polychromy created by the alternation of stones and bricks drawing often geometric patterns, and the richness of frescoes and icons. The church of the monastery of Gracanica with its double cross plan, its brick and stone bonding in pink-orange tones, its clever play of arches and domes creating a feeling of elevation despite the massiveness of the building, and its impressive cycle of frescoes; and the patriarchal monastery of Peć with its 3 churches with facades preceded by monumental narthexes and interiors covered with rich frescoes, are the great representatives of this school. The Morava school will push this structural and ornamental richness even further, imposing in particular the model of the trefoil plan and polychrome facades decorated with refined plastic elements. The monastery of the Holy Archangels is the proud representative. To this Serbo-Byzantine style will also be added Romanesque and Gothic influences from the West. The monastery of Visoki Dekani is the flagship example. Its cathedral, the largest of the Balkans, between the sobriety of its external lines borrowed from the Romanesque and its ornamental richness all Byzantine, offers a seizing mixture of the kinds.Ottoman heritage
Under the Ottoman reign, the cities will experience a new development, developing around vast complexes including mosques, medersas (Koranic schools), imarets (popular kitchens), inns, baths and hammams, and libraries; this complex adjoining the bazaar. The Ottoman mosque is characterized by a centered plan; clever sets of domes whose overlapping creates effects of pyramidal waves; minarets with fine and tapered silhouettes; varied arches; a subtlety in the balance of masses and volumes; and an importance given to the light that illuminates the prayer room whose each decorative element reveals an extreme refinement of the work of stone. The bazaars are made up of a dense and regular network of alleys to which wooden stores are attached. The hammams, which can be recognized by their openwork domes, as well as the numerous fountains, translate a fascinating architecture of water. Tekkés (sets including a mosque, the tomb of a saint and the lodges for the dervishes who officiate there) and mausoleums complete this panorama. In Prizren, the Sinan-Pacha mosque, the most important of all Kosovo, impresses by the monumentality of its domes and especially the richness of the decorations surrounding its mihrab (niche indicating Mecca) giving pride of place to calligraphic and floral motifs. Its dozens of other sumptuous mosques, its vast double hammam, its powerful and elegant stone bridges, its fountains and its bazaar with multiple houses of craftsmen are among the other Ottoman wealth of Prizren. Wealth that we find in Gjakova with its Grand Bazaar with paved streets lined with small houses with wooden shutters, its Hadum mosque with superb decorations of arabesques and interlacing, its Terzi Bridge which, with its 190 m, was once the longest bridge in Kosovo, and its 7 tekkés. As for Pristina, it is under Ottoman rule that it goes from small village to large city, centered around the incredible imperial mosque
, which we admire the dome of 15.5 m in diameter supported by a clever system of pendentives (each of the four spherical triangles provided between the large arches), and decorated with sumptuous mosaics with floral and geometric patterns. Pristina also houses one of the finest examples of Ottoman house: the residential complex Emin Gjik, transformed into an ethnological museum. The organization of the Ottoman house is governed by a permanent concern for privacy. The protective wall of the house is pierced by an entrance that gives access to the garden or the courtyard. The house itself is flanked by a porch that offers both a final protection and a meeting space. The most important room is the oda, which serves as a reception room for guests and travelers, as well as a meeting room for the men. All these elements can be found in the vernacular architecture of Kosovo, with whitewashed walls protecting houses with wooden structures filled with cob and roofs made of a wooden mesh covered with tiles. From the seventeenth century, Kosovo also sees the appearance of the first kullas, which will become widespread in the following centuries. The kullas are fortified tower-houses with thick walls pierced with loopholes on the first floor and small windows on the upper floors. The first floor is used as a barn, thefirst floor is used for the family, while thesecond floor houses the "oda e burrave", the meeting room reserved for men. On the upper floors, wooden elements can be added such as external stairs, balconies and galleries. There are many kullas in the Dukagjini region. Among the most impressive are the Haxhi Zeka or Pasha Kulla in Pela, and the Kulla of Abdullah Pashë Dreni in Gjakova.Yugoslav period
Like most authoritarian regimes, socialist Yugoslavia initially opted for monumental classical architecture. After the Second World War, it was associated for a time with the Soviet bloc, whose infatuation with socialist realism, all to the glory of communist values, it shared. But this association did not last, as the new Yugoslavia finally found in the new formal research of modernism the tools to demonstrate its power. The motto of the time: "Destroy the old, build the new The government decides to destroy all the pre-modern heritage ... a name that designates, in reality, the Ottoman heritage, associated then with the Albanian culture. Popular fronts are created to destroy these witnesses of history, like the bazaar of Pristina whose two hundred stores, held then by Albanians, are completely razed. Destroy therefore... but also build. In 1959, the municipal council of Pristina proposed an urbanization plan with new apartments and new health and service infrastructures. Functionality was the order of the day, and uniform building blocks with geometric volumes and openwork concrete balconies flourished. The Spomeniks, monumental concrete memorials, mixing expressionism and abstraction, were also built to express the spirit of fraternity, union and modernity of the new socialist era. Among the most famous, let us note the monument of Brotherhood and Unity, an astonishing white concrete structure rising like two arms stretched towards the sky in Pristina, or the sanctuary of the Revolution in Mitrovica, a real concrete dolmen. Brutalism inspired by Le Corbusier will also be very fashionable with its concrete walls, its massive, angular and repetitive geometric forms and its flat roofs, as in the Cultural Center of Kaçanik and the workers' dwellings of Gjilan. But if we had to remember only two buildings from this Yugoslav period, it would obviously be the National Library of Kosovo and the Palace of Youth and Sports
, both in Pristina. The first, the work of Croatian Andrija Mutnjakovic, is astonishing with its 99 translucent domes, its marble and plaster decorations and its latticework of aluminum hexagons enveloping its volumes and favoring lighting and ventilation. The second one is composed of different pavilions mixing glass and concrete and offering amazing spaces, notably the roof on which it is possible to walk. An effervescence which will be brutally stopped by the fratricidal wars which will plunge the country into chaos. It is then a question of destroying the architecture, seen as the paradigm of the culture of the other. The Serbian population destroyed all forms of Islamic heritage, while the Albanians attacked the Serbian monasteries and churches. A war of identities that will leave the country bruised and bloodless.Contemporary Kosovo
By proclaiming its independence, Kosovo is entering a phase of optimism that is accompanied by a demographic and real estate explosion. But in the absence of a legal framework, cities, and especially Pristina, are seeing a proliferation of standardized, low-quality buildings that encroach on the smallest open space, also leading to the destruction of the existing heritage. With its "Urban Development Plan 2012-2022", Pristina is trying to plan its urban development in a more rational way, by rethinking its roads and its new neighborhoods, but the latter, which are highly westernized, unfortunately give precedence to the car over the pedestrian, to gigantism over minimalism, to glass and steel towers over traditional houses. Fortunately, initiatives are emerging to try to do better and differently. The Kosovo Architecture Foundation, the largest organization of its kind based in Pristina, received the prestigious Keeping it modern award from the Getty Foundation for its work in documenting the National Library for its conservation and historic preservation, and its contribution to promoting local architecture while building bridges with designers from around the world through its design and architecture platform. Përparim Rama has put his home country on the map by winning the World Interiors News Award for his original design of the Hammam Jazz Bar in Pristina, which revisits traditional Kosovar techniques in an elegant brutalism. Among the most recent creations, the Lakeside Hotel & Spa in Vërmica features simple white geometric volumes and profiled aluminum panels. Kosovo is also a land of innovation, with Architecture for Humans' "Zero Emissions Neighborhood" project focusing on passive buildings, active solar systems and energy-efficient infrastructure and appliances. After decades of destruction, Kosovo is imagining a sustainable future.
