The origins
The first large-scale prehistoric sedentary cultures were characterized by earthen dwellings, followed by wattle-and-daub (wooden framework and cob). Rectangular in plan, these houses stood on small foundations and had tiled floors, usually made of clay. The roofs, generally gabled, were thatched. The villages of Tarintsi, Anzabegovo and Tumba Madzari still have vestiges of this early architecture. The shores of Lake Ohrid are home to traces of palafittic habitat, i.e. houses built on stilts to adapt to the lake environment. In the Bronze Age, houses were built in stone and in places that were difficult to access. Megalithic architecture continued into the Iron Age, as demonstrated by the stone and painted ceramic tombs of the Demir Kapiya necropolis and the princely tombs of Trebenichta. But the country's most impressive megalithic site remains Kokino Rock. Its stone elements are spread over two platforms 19 m apart. Just look at the lower platform, flanked by four stone thrones illuminated by the sun's rays! The country experienced a new boom in Antiquity, initially under the influence of Greece. This marked the birth of the first fortified towns surrounded by ramparts, usually built of dry stone. Between scenography and functionality, this theatrical urbanization had the agora as its focal point. The dominant style is the Doric order, which can be recognized by the impression of strength and simplicity it gives off, and by its massive, squat columns. The Bylazora site is a perfect example. Crossed by the Via Egnatia, the great communication route built by the Romans, large urban centers appeared. Heraclea Lyncestis (Bitola) is one of these. The site boasts impressive porticoes (galleries with columns in front of the buildings), thermal baths, theaters, defensive and votive structures. Scupi (Skopje), the only city to have been entirely founded by the Romans, boasts remains that illustrate the blend of monumentalism and pragmatism that characterizes Roman architecture: see its aqueduct with its fifty-five stone arches, its theater, its thermal baths and civil basilicas. Stobi, for its part, preserves fine traces of this still highly theatrical urban planning, with its buildings arranged in three terraces overlooking the river, its enclosures punctuated by monumental gates and its beautiful mosaic-decorated residences.
Medieval splendors
Surrounded by Cyclopean walls (made of huge, irregular blocks) and protected by circular or square towers, Macedonian stone fortresses are divided into an upper courtyard with the keep (lordly residence) and a lower courtyard (a sort of small town housing craftsmen and merchants). Among the great vestiges of this defensive architecture are the towers of Kratovo, the fortress of Isar, whose surrounding walls were over 1.3 m wide, the fortress of Samuel with its eighteen square towers, four monumental gates and walls up to 16 m high, and the astonishing fortress of Skopje with its towers and remains of religious, military and commercial buildings.
The Middle Ages were also a period of religious effervescence and marked the triumph of Byzantine architecture. Byzantine architecture was always characterized by meticulous stone and brick bonding (brick allowing greater lightness and flexibility, and thus the creation of vaults and domes), well-balanced volumes and a great deal of interior decoration. Floor pavements, in brick or marble, reveal astonishing techniques such asopus sectile, made with marble or colored stone slabs, sometimes in colored glass, cut and assembled to form a figurative motif. But the most important element of Byzantine decoration is the fresco, made from mineral or vegetable powders added to lime, the paint then being applied to fresh mortar before drying. Bright colors, great expressiveness and rich motifs characterize these frescoes. Originally simple and square in plan, preceded by a narthex (a kind of portico or vestibule) and surmounted by one or two domes, Byzantine churches progressively opted for more elaborate cross-shaped plans, in particular the inscribed cross plan, offering fascinating interplays of volume and geometry, and where the iconostases (superb carved wooden panels separating the sanctuary, reserved for priests, from the naos, the central room reserved for penitents) particularly stand out. Multiple domes and sublime effects of polychromy between stone and brick complete these evolutions. Nicknamed the "Jerusalem of the Balkans", Ohrid boasts some of the finest and oldest masterpieces of Byzantine architecture, starting with the Church of St. John in Kaneo. Another masterpiece is the Church of St. George in Kurbinovo, which has recently undergone a major restoration phase. The monasteries of Lesnovo, Treskavets, Polog and Sveti Naum, whose silhouettes are reminiscent of fortresses and whose various buildings are organized around large courtyards, are also not to be missed.
Ottoman riches
The central feature of the Ottoman city is the bazaar, or carsija, which can be recognized by its network of narrow cobbled streets lined with low houses housing stalls. Within the bazaar is the bezisten, or covered market, rectangular in plan, covered with vaults and domes, and accessed through monumental doors. But the bazaar isn't just a place to shop, it's also home to all the city's landmark buildings, starting with the mosques. These are generally square in plan, topped by a dome and flanked by an elegant, slender minaret. Although sober on the outside, the mosques reveal a very rich interior décor, with painted or sculpted elements in earthenware, marble or wood, notably following the muqarnas or stalactite motif, and superb calligraphic inscriptions. The large, open central courtyard around which the mosques were organized often housed one or more elaborately geometrically shaped turbs or mausoleums, also topped by domes and sometimes decorated with superb ornamental faience. Mosques were themselves often integrated into larger complexes comprising medersas or Koranic schools, imarets or popular kitchens, and caravanserais, vast inns and warehouses organized around an enclosed courtyard surrounded by a two-storey gallery. There was also a wealth of water architecture, as illustrated by the hammams. These generally consist of two identical structures, one reserved for men and the other for women. The large water rooms are crowned by domes and decorated with elegant geometric or floral motifs. The Ottomans also built numerous clock towers, often with square stone bases, octagonal shafts and terraced brick tops, as well as superb houses with stone foundations and corbelled wooden storeys. Skopje's legendary Old Bazaar, in the Stara Čaršija district, is home to some of the finest treasures of Ottoman architecture, such as the Mustafa-Pasha, Sultan Murat and Aladja mosques, the Daout Pasha hammam and the Suli caravanserai. The Bitola Bazaar is another must-see, with its Yeni mosque and Deboy hammam. Of course, don't miss Tetovo's unique and fascinating colorful mosque. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Ottoman Empire began to weaken. This led to a revival of Christian architecture and an opening up to Western influences. Led by the Mijacki masters, who came from the mountain villages and organized themselves into groups mastering all areas of construction, including woodcarving, this revival resulted in buildings incorporating Byzantine codes, but taking decorative research even further, as exemplified by the St. John-Bigorsky monastery. One of the leading exponents of this "national revival" is Andrea Damjanov, whose work includes the Church of the Nativity of the Virgin in Skopje and the Church of the Assumption in Novo-Selo. In Skopje, this eclecticism can be seen in buildings such as the Ristíc Palace, with its blend of neo-Baroque, neo-Byzantine and even Art Nouveau, or in Bitola, nicknamed "the city of consuls", with its abundance of palaces and mansions decorated with stucco and painted in pastel shades.
Triumph of modernism
On the night of July 25-26, 1963, a terrible earthquake shook the country. Skopje was the hardest hit, with 80% of its buildings destroyed. As the world became bogged down in the Cold War, the UN set up a vast program of international solidarity, calling on the best experts from East and West to make Skopje a symbol of hope. First of all, Poland's Adolf Ciborowski, who had already worked on the reconstruction of Warsaw, was entrusted with the task of rethinking the city. He changed the city's orientation and followed the contours of the Vardar, whose banks were left to nature or transformed into green spaces (a way of avoiding building in the middle of a flood zone), while new major roads were built to accommodate the city's future growth. Vast boulevards were also created, lined with large apartment blocks separated by green spaces, as well as large shopping centers. The important thing was to be able to quickly relocate the population and revive the economy. The city center, meanwhile, is to be completely redesigned by the renowned Japanese architect Kenzo Tange, whose global approach is based on functions and needs. He sees the city as a series of hubs with a variety of functions - administrative, commercial, cultural, residential - all organized around public squares. The city center is surrounded by the Gradski Zid or "City Wall", a sort of belt of large blocks of flats. At the same time, a deep respect for the historic buildings led the architects to keep the buildings low-rise around the Old Bazaar and to limit the height of the buildings around the fortress so as not to spoil the view. The style favored for this reconstruction was Brutalism. This term designates architecture without cladding, based on the logical use of materials that directly announces the function of the construction. Although Kenzo Tange's project was not completed in its entirety, his creations have nonetheless become symbols of the city, such as Macedonia Square and its large shopping mall, the Grand Opera House, and above all the "Railway Bridge", a monumental edifice that required no less than 70,000m3 of concrete and 11,000 t of iron. Skopje is dotted with symbols of this modernist revival: the robot-like telecommunications building with its porthole windows, the Saints Cyril and Methodius University with its triangular and rectangular volumes interlocking in a symphony of concrete, and the now-famous Goce Delcev student residence. Symbolizing the progressive and socialist impulses of Tito's Yugoslavia, this concrete architecture is also revealed in large-scale memorials, such as Krusevo's Makedonium, an astonishing concrete "viral cell" overlooking a necropolis of columns. Described by some as grey and soulless, this modernist concrete architecture is, for many, indissociable from a past that is sometimes idealized and now goes by the name of "yugostalgia".
Quest for identity
In the 2000s, the ultraconservative right then in power launched the Skopje2014 program. The aim was to showcase North Macedonia's ancient roots, to claim the legacy of Alexander the Great as the foundation of the country's identity, and thus to conceal Yugoslavia's past. The project soon attracted a great deal of criticism, not least for its erroneous re-reading of history and its exorbitant cost. Numerous architects were also forced to sue for copyright infringement, their modernist creations having been distorted without their authorization. Between 2010 and 2016, one hundred and thirty monuments and statues, veritable neoclassical behemoths, were erected or renovated on a perimeter of barely 2 km2, including the Archaeological Museum, the Macedonian National Theatre, the Assembly Palace and, above all, the Macedonian Gate, a 21 m-high triumphal arch sculpted with bas-reliefs exalting the (supposed!) heroes of the nation. Colonnades, gilding, decorated pediments, cornices bending under the weight of the sculptures... this very kitsch architecture will be the first target of the 2016 "color revolution". Rejecting ultraconservatism, young Macedonians splashed bright colors on the capital's walls, as if to underline its historical and social aberration. Contemporary architecture in North Macedonia is a product of these struggles, and innovations are still rare, although the transformation of Skopje's Skanderbeg Square, which elegantly blends art, architecture and landscaping, is worthy of note. The true identity of North Macedonia lies in its picturesque villages. The elegant houses of Ohrid, the kuki of Krouchevo and the fortress-houses of Galitchnik all share common features. Their foundations are made of stone masonry reinforced with planks to ensure greater resistance to earthquakes. The upper storeys are made up of a wooden framework, completed with wooden laths, brick or stone rubble, then covered with lime plaster. The whole structure is pierced by numerous narrow, symmetrically-spaced windows. The first floor is reserved for food and livestock storage, while the upper floors are used for housing. They are organized around a central staircase and the house's flagship space: the cardak, a large common room used as a living room and reception area. Often cubic in shape, these houses are topped by hipped roofs covered in tiles or slate. At a time when the country's major cities are suffering from extreme pollution, these villages offer a haven of peace and purity, and have become ambassadors for ecotourism that respects the unique, wild identity of Northern Macedonia.
