Vilnius, unlocked design challenges

The bridge over the Vilnia River, which flows into the Neris, was wooden until 1891, when it was decided to replace it with a more robust metal bridge and commemorate its significant location. The bridge engineers were faced with the challenge of how to adequately remind people crossing the river how special this place is.

It was decided that the key to making the bridge meaningful was to decorate it with a coat of arms, which have always been considered a sign of social distinction, privileged status, and nobility. Heraldry – the system of designing and using coats of arms – originated when most people were still illiterate but could easily distinguish between bright, simple symbols. At that time, Lithuania already had several recognisable symbols, such as ‘Vytis’, the knight on horseback, which is why it was chosen for the bridge decor. Interestingly, in 1845, the stylised Vytis was attached to the railing of the bridge with the crown of the Russian Tsars rather than of the Dukes of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The crowning of the Knight with the symbolism of the Russian Tsars was a sign of political subordination to the Russian Empire, to which the Vilnius Governorate then belonged. However, historians still wonder why the cross on the Knight’s shield is not the Orthodox eight-pointed cross but rather the six-pointed cross typical of a knight of the times of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

In inter-war Vilnius, as now, advertisements tried to attract the attention of the citizens. For a long time, people used to put up various advertisements on special boards; only they were not very visible to people travelling around the city on various means of transport. So, the challenge was how to catch the eyes of passing commuters.

The key to solving this problem has taken on rounded shapes. The city witnessed the emergence of advertising columns with decorative ‘caps’ and modern-style mast-like ornaments on top. The first such structures appeared in 1936. They were specially placed on the edge of the pavement so that not only pedestrians but also people in vehicles could read the posters. In that year, 20 advertising columns were erected, followed by ten more a year later, at the cost of 180 zloty each. Those wishing to put up an A4-sized poster had to pay 1.5 zloty for the first day and 0.4 zloty for the following days; the city government earned about 10-11,000 zloty a year from such adverts. 

In the 1870s, a pharmacy was planned for the central street of Užupis. Furniture and other interior design solutions had to be created to suit this activity. The pharmacists of the time were convinced that a successful pharmaceutical business, which would be able to pass from one generation to the next, needed a durable solution. What was it? The room where visitors to the pharmacy would drop in was called the ‘oficina’. It had to inspire a sense of confidence as soon as you entered. 

So it was decided to create furniture in solid dark wood, to provide a place for the pharmacist’s tools to be clearly visible, and to mark the shelf compartments in Latin. This key to longevity has been proven to be right. After more than a hundred years, the pharmacy ceased trading. The premises then housed a shop selling healthy drinks and snacks and now houses a dessert shop. Although the use of the space has changed, the interior has retained the furniture of the original pharmacy. The old design, interpreted by the new owners, still conveys a sense of credibility. 

In the city, one shop is constantly replaced by another. For instance, the V. Savickis pharmacy ‘Po saule’ was replaced by the Catholic Church of the Święty Wojciech bookstore, managed by Leonas Žynda. It was necessary to announce this change to the townspeople – to draw the attention of passers-by and to inform them of the activities that would now be carried out there. 

Bolesław, the son of the owner of the bookstore, was friends with Edward Kuczyński, a graphic artist who had recently graduated from the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of St. Stephen Báthory and was a student of the famous artist Ferdynand Ruszczyc. Edward offered the key to the solution. In 1936, he painted the façade of the building using a sgraffito technique that was very rare in the city. The entire painting consisted of nine shield-shaped illustrations. The main panel indicated the name of the bookshop, while the other eight were thematic. On both sides of the name of the shop, the artist painted the symbol of the bookshop – an open book against the background of the sun. In those days, this was referred to as a coat of arms rather than a logo or emblem. The exterior of the bookshop was recognised the following year as a state-protected work of art. Today, it can still be considered one of the most beautiful in Vilnius.

In 1897, Mikhail and Sofia Prozorov were a famous Vilnius couple. The architect and public figure decided to construct a huge building on A. Jakšto Street, on the site of two previous plots. It was to be public, representative, and residential premises. The times dictated the extensive use of decorative elements. The challenge for the owners was how to decorate the huge space beautifully and efficiently. 

Industrial design is the key to the solution. In the second half of the 19th century, with the arrival of the railway and the rush to build factories, Vilnius underwent modernisation. The number of duplicated products increased, including interior components and fittings. The Prozorov family took advantage of technological progress, which is why it is worth looking in all directions when you visit the building numbered A. Jakšto g. 9 – note the closing mechanisms of the windows, doors, handles, and handrails. These are beautiful and functional interior elements produced in large quantities and found in other buildings. When you look down, you will see floors worthy of attention. Not only are the staircases decorated, but the landings are too. The mosaic concrete used for the decoration was often made right here in Vilnius, while the ceramic tiles were much more frequently imported. The main producers of such tiles in the city were the Eduards Pomereningas factory, the ‘Betonas’ workshop, the ‘Medūza’ concrete mosaic factory and several others. 

Nowadays, it’s hard to imagine a city without rubbish bins, especially when almost every new item has its own packaging. The contents of public bins could tell us a lot about the lifestyles and habits of our citizens. Just imagine if you had the opportunity to see what was thrown away by Vilnius residents in the 1950s. This is what designer Alexey Grigoriev had the opportunity to think about when he was tasked with creating a solution that met the needs of the city’s citizens. 

Alexey Grigoriev, who once came to Vilnius from the then Leningrad, became one of the city’s most important designers. It was he who created the masterpieces of classical design in small architecture – the litter bin urns. In the spring of 1953, several thousand of these urns adorned the public spaces of Vilnius. They became one of the distinctive signs of the capital (and later all over Lithuania). Back then, if you looked inside one, you would probably have seen an apple core, a candy wrapper, and a folded newspaper. 

On the corner of Dominikonų and Šv. Ignoto Streets, there is a building whose Gothic cellars date back to the 16th century. More than four hundred years later, it housed a restaurant whose name directly reflects the building’s history: the ‘Old Cellar’ (‘Senasis rūsys’). The owners of the restaurant decided to protect themselves against hooliganism by protecting the ground-floor windows with bars. The challenge was how to turn a functional object into a decorative element while still respecting the historical context of the building. 

In 1979, thanks to the blacksmith Leonas Vytautas Glinskis, the windows of the building on the Dominikonų Street side were enveloped by impressive twisted metal grille bars. A drinking glass in the centre hints to passers-by of the fun that used to be had in the restaurant. Interestingly, this exterior decoration is not the only one that survives from the time when the restaurant opened. If you look up at the corner of the building, you can see the original metal lamp fixture above the door.

During the Soviet era, it was decided during the construction of the Old Town of Vilnius that the buildings that had not survived the war would not be rebuilt but replaced by new ones. But to prevent the architectural newcomers to the Old Town from becoming out of place next to their elderly neighbours, solutions had to be found that were in keeping with the historic environment. 

The Jašiūnai Brickyard, founded in 1895, which became the Jašiūnai Experimental Plant in the post-war period, began to become part of the solution. It began to produce non-standard ceramic building materials for the old towns of Vilnius, Trakai, Kaunas, Klaipėda and other Lithuanian towns. One of its most easily recognisable products is the stylised fish-scale tile whose colour and raw materials were ancient but with a new-age shape. The most convenient place to see (and even touch) the tiles of the Jašiūnai factory in Vilnius is the kindergarten on Lydos Street. There is also an apartment building at Pilies g. 23, the former ‘Moscow’ Cinema at Didžioji g. 28 and the Vilnius University Library at Universiteto g. 3. 

In 1965, a new cinema was built in Vilnius. It was the first modern panoramic cinema in the then Soviet Lithuania – an important public building. That is why it was grandly named ‘Lietuva’. As the opening approached, the modern cinema lacked a modern signboard. The architects and designers of the time, despite the Soviet occupation, wanted to be on a par with Western Europe and emphasise with their design that ‘we are Europeans’. The artist Linas Katinas took up this challenge.

L. Katinas, who had just graduated from the Lithuanian Institute of Arts with a degree in architecture, looked for the key in foreign examples. The architect did not hide the fact that he was most inspired by the logo of SAS, a Scandinavian airline. And 55 years after creating the signboard, he even admitted: “I didn’t create it; I ripped it off! We sat down with the Nasvyčiai architects – they liked it too. No one thought about copyright back then. That’s how it came about”. Today, the MO Museum, designed by Libeskind, stands on the site of ‘Lietuva’, but the cinema’s signboard has been preserved – it adorns the sculpture garden of the MO Museum.

The Soviet authorities had a major challenge in removing the signs, symbols, customs, and traditions of religion and belief from the public life of the occupied countries. Wedding ceremonies did not escape such revision. While architects usually ‘redecorated’ the established habits of movement in space, here, the planning of the rooms and the placement of the furniture had to reinvent the rite of marriage as a secular ritual, avoiding any connection with religion and its symbols. 

The first building in Lithuania and neighbouring countries dedicated to non-church marriages was designed by an ambitious team led by the architect Gediminas Baravykas. The interior, almost unchanged to this day, is dominated by two types of spaces: a vertical, closed, and high space for the formal ceremonial halls and a horizontal, open, cosier lobby for the final procession. According to Eugenijus Gūzas, who designed the furniture, he and G. Baravykas agreed that ‘the table where the main ritual of the marriage is performed, had to fulfil the same function of a church altar’. The stained-glass windows by the artist Konstantinas Šatūnas and the tapestries by the textile artist Zinaida Kalpokovaitė-Vogelienė on the back walls of the halls became the backdrop for the ritual that takes place at the ‘altar-table’. Tourists were brought from all over the USSR to see these solutions, and in 1976, the creators of the building were awarded a prize by the USSR Council of Ministers, testifying to the fact that the perfect key to unlocking the design challenge had been found. 

At the beginning of 1964, a revolution took place in Lithuanian book publishing. The three giant state publishing houses changed their formerly cumbersome and longwinded names to short and easy-to-remember ones. The State Publishing House of Political and Scientific Literature became ‘Mintis’, the State Publishing House of Pedagogical Literature became ‘Šviesa’, and the State Publishing House of Fiction became ‘Vaga’. In February of that year, a nationwide competition was announced to create emblems for the publishing houses. Who took up this challenge and became the designer of the new ‘Vaga’` logo? 

The winner of the competition was Antanas Kučas, a graphic artist and future professor at the Vilnius Art Institute. The key to success was the use of the visual trends of the time and, like every artist who experienced the Soviet occupation, the desire to employ national elements. The magazine ‘Naujos knygos’ wrote the following about the flower-decorated four-letter composition: “The font-ornamental emblem of Kučas’ logo is clear, memorable, and has national character”. The ‘Vaga’ logo is still in use today and adorns the now-renovated building of the publishing house on Gediminas Avenue. 

Urban trees are a bit different from deciduous trees in larger spaces. For example, the roots of the tree need to be protected, which is why it is important to attach tree grates to the pavement to enclose the trunk. The challenge for the engineers was to create an object that fulfils its primary function while contributing to the overall appearance of the street. After all, it is not only the big buildings that define the street but also small elements such as tiles, litter bins, or benches. 

The key was found in the early post-war period. The root protection grates are designed to mimic vegetal patterns. This solution was not only aesthetically pleasing but also practical: the pattern created enough hollow areas to allow air to circulate and the soil to breathe. Few of these floral grates have survived in Vilnius, but there are some that can still be admired on Jogailos and A. Stulginskio Streets. You can walk along Gediminas Avenue comparing them – note how their aesthetics have become simpler over time.

In 1948, Jewellery Shop No. 2 was opened. Twenty years later, it was ripe for reconstruction and a new name. The challenge of the interior design was twofold: to create a modern atmosphere that would reveal the aesthetics of the jewellery and accessories offered for purchase and, of course, to introduce the new name of the shop – ‘Eglė’. 

The symbolic date chosen for the opening of the reconstructed store was 8 March 1970, International Women’s Day. The new, sleek ‘Eglė’ emblem invited ladies to choose a luxury gift. The craftsmen of the commercial advertising workshop belonging to the then Ministry of Commerce not only designed the emblem but also three ‘plafonds’, also known as illuminated light boxes. These advertised ‘Aviator’ watches made in Moscow, ‘Juveel’ silverware, and precious stones polished at the ‘Kristal’ factory in Belarus. Much of the interior, with its advertising lightboxes and furniture covered in faux leather (dermantine), has survived. It is one of the few places in Vilnius that can instantly transport visitors back to the second half of the 20th century. 

In 1992, an optician’s was established in Vilnius Old Town on Pilies Street; it needed a signboard for the opening. However, the sensitive historical environment demanded a subtle solution that fit the context. How was this challenge solved? 

Handmade metal signboards have always been popular in cities and have a long history of durability. At a time when a large part of the population was still illiterate, visual depictions rather than written signs were more popular. Shopkeepers tried to make it clear to passers-by what was available for purchase. Historical signboards in European cities still depict large scissors, cheese, a shoe, and so on, so when the Pilies Street Optician’s opened its doors, it decided to go back to the old tradition and depict a large lorgnette – a folding pair of opera-style glasses with a handle. 

At the peak of his group’s fame in 1995, the leader of the Šiauliai band ‘Bix’, Saulius Urbonavičius-Samas, decided to establish his own embassy in Vilnius. A bar was set up in the centre of the capital; it needed a rebellious interior that reflected the band’s music and style: “I made it very clear that if we were going to build a bar, it would be ‘Bixian’, both in design and in the idea in general”, said Samas. He completed the challenge with flying colours. 

The key to the bar’s interior design idea was sought by a ‘Bix’ member outside Lithuania. The musicians, who were gaining popularity at the time, were regularly performing in foreign countries. After travelling halfway around the world, they visited many famous rock bars. Samas remembers: “At that time, most of the cafes and bars in Vilnius were very similar, often resembling post-Soviet canteens with plastic chairs and pictures made of amber on the walls. At ‘Bix’, it’s the opposite. Instead of creating things specially designed for the bar, old things were reused – and not necessarily for their original purpose! This is how the front door was fitted with a washing machine door, wooden train carriage seats were used as outdoor benches, and various household items were hung on the walls as elements of the unique décor. Some of the interior details were created by the members of ‘Bix’ themselves. In its 25 years of existence, the bar has withstood several generations and fashion changes, survived economic crises, and nothing has changed. In the opinion of the bar’s managers, a good thing lasts forever. 

The theme of the 2011 ‘Neformate’ competition organised by the Lithuanian Design Forum was ‘Public Furniture’, which had to be functional and easy to use, as well as able to withstand the challenges of the Lithuanian climate. Six contestants found the key to the solution, but we can only see one of them. 

The only surviving exhibit of the competition is the bench ‘Lietvamzdis’ (‘Ranwater Pipe’). It is made of metal pipes, so it does not collect water – you can sit on it even in the rain. The authors of the “Lietvamzdis’ are members of the former creative collective ‘Jedendu’: A. Kučerenkaitė, J. Bučelis, V. Gečas, N. Keblys, T. Stalnionis, M. Puipaitė, and E. Skuodaitė. The fate of the other five exhibits in this competition is rather dramatic; one of the pieces did not survive the harsh climatic challenges, while the other four disappeared from public spaces within the first month!

In 2006, the ‘Neformate’ industrial design competition was launched. The challenge for the contestants was defined by the theme itself – ‘The Peculiarities of National Seating’. The witty-sounding task invited designers to study and reveal the Lithuanian culture of sitting! 

The theme of the competition inspired Paulius Vitkauskas, who was studying at the Vilnius Academy of Arts at the time. The key that unlocked the challenge of national seating was a ten-legged chair with the swinging name ‘Ku-dir-ka’. Various appraisers find different codes of ‘Lithuanianness’ in the design of this seat – from the fact that the legs of the rocking chair are reminiscent of old implements to the rhythmic sound that the furniture makes. During the competition, ‘Ku-dir-ka’ made the young designer famous, and the piece of furniture became the face of Lithuanian design, still representing it today. 

For a long time, the stretch of Gediminas Avenue leading to Žvėrynas was rather lacking in vibrancy. The reconstruction of Lukiškių Square and the creation of cafés around the square created the first impulses for the avenue to revive itself into a bustling thoroughfare. The establishment of a modern business centre, a hotel, as well as residential and public spaces, have breathed life back into this area. All this is a project of the real estate development company ‘Eika’. The authors of the project decided that an interactive art installation was needed at the edge of the spaces to stimulate the curiosity of passers-by. For this challenge, the innovative artist Julijonas Urbonas was invited to create some art for this public space. 

Urbonas came up with a playful key to unlock this design challenge – he designed a slide for adults, otherwise known as a corporate playground. The unusual way of ascending the slide is that one can imagine business people in their office attire going up an escalator, and then, according to the artist, there is no longer any question of what to do next because ‘the buttocks are immediately pulled towards the ground’. 

Over the last few years, Vilnius residents have started to explore the capital more actively and have added more urban spaces to their favourite places to walk; among such spots are the banks of the Neris. The problem was that there were no places to rest on the long stretches of walks. The question was how to make the most of the Neris riverside environment without building benches or embarking on grandiose restoration works.

The key to relaxation was proposed by the designer Vytautas Puzeras. He came up with the idea of using the Soviet-era concrete embankment architecture and installing seating in rectangular holes – like a bee filling a honeycomb with honey, hence the project initiated by Puzeras being called ‘The Riverside Honeycomb’. 

The beginning of design in Lithuania, which can be counted from the mid-20th century, can be traced back to one personality – Feliksas Daukantas. He was a pioneer of design education, the author of numerous articles and initiatives, and the founder of the Department of Artistic Construction of Industrial Products at the Lithuanian Institute of Arts (now the Department of Design). Feliksas’ design solutions cover a wide range of objects – from amber jewellery to the electric clock in the Vilnius Central Post Office. The designer, who worked in the capital from 1947 until the end of his life, needed a suitably smart memorial plaque. The designer Šarūnas Šlektavičius took up the challenge. 

An interactive rectangle adorns the wall of Jakšto g. 13. The idea behind it is the portrait of F. Daukantas, which only reveals itself from a distance. This memorial plaque is made up of a series of dotted graphic elements, reflecting the diversity of the designer’s work and influences. 

Scan the QR code in the left-hand corner, and you will find a link to the Wikipedia page on the artist. This is an invitation not only to unlock the design personality code but also to learn more about the stories related to it. 

During the Soviet era, the overly explicit religious content – St. Christopher with the baby Jesus on his shoulder – of the heraldry of the capital was condemned to oblivion. In this respect, Vilnius had perhaps suffered most, as the coats of arms of other Lithuanian cities were tolerated, although some adjustments had to be made to take account of the whims of the Soviet authorities, which promoted atheism. In 1990, after the restoration of the Lithuanian state, Vilnius regained the right to use its historical coat of arms. The challenge was to resurrect it from oblivion. 

St. Christopher (Kristoforas) was first mentioned in the 16th–century privilege of Sigismund Augustus. It is likely that the Saint symbolised the transition from a pagan to a religious land. ‘To carry Christ’ represented following a new faith. Interestingly, in his ‘History of the Lithuanian Nation’, the 19th–century historian T. Narbutas wondered whether the coat of arms of Vilnius might not have first depicted the fairy-tale giant Alcis and was later replaced by St. Christopher. The new coat of arms designed by the artist Arvydas Každailis was approved on 17 April 1991; it differs only stylistically from the old one.