Thanks to student projects, the former brick school in Bialystok will be transformed into a cultural center and meeting place. The new owners of the historic building are the Wydział Architektury Politechniki Białostockiej students of the future architects entrusted with the task of creating a new development concept.
Tarbut School, located at 41D Lipowa Street in Bialystok, is one of the best-preserved examples of the "Bialystok school of masonry." This is the style customarily used to describe yellow and red brick buildings erected at the turn of the 20th century.
Competition "New concept of the old Tarbut school".
Photo: Dariusz Piekut
how will the old school be transformed?
Before World War II, the building housed a general Hebrew school run by the Tarbut organization. In the 1980s it was the site of a Special Basic Vocational School. Lukanova Construction bought it from the City of Bialystok in 2023, and has now organized a competition for students to come up with a new concept for its development, with 18 entries.
We would very much like to make a private school in this building, while in general the purpose of this building is education, but in my opinion education is also creative centers, cultural centers, art galleries, certain multi-generational meeting places. So that we can spend rainy evenings not sitting at home, but visiting a place where we will meet our allies, start some dialogue or learn something
- Elena Lukanova, president of Lukanova Construction, talks about the goal of the project.
first prize in the competition
The first prize in the competition went to the work by Matthew Suszko and Wojciech Gryko. Thanks to their project, the shape of which fits into the local urban planning, the former Tarbut school will turn into a new meeting place for the local community. The first floor of the new building will house a café.
Competition "New concept of the old Tarbut school".
photo: Dariusz Piekut
We wanted the new body to be a background for the historic building, which has survived despite many obstacles. We designed a risalit, which in its shape refers to the canopy in the front wall of the building
- explains Wojciech Gryko, a 6th semester architecture student.
The authors of the winning work received a prize of PLN 3,800 and laptops.
creative projects of young architects
The authors of the work that won second place in the competition were Jakub Skarzynski and Diana Syrovatska. With their design they wanted to connect the passage between the nearby opera house and Lipowa Street and, as they say, "give them some life." The work awarded the third prize, by Mateusz Radkiewicz and Tomasz Musiuk, had a similar goal.
"New concept of the old Tarbut school" competition.
Photo: Dariusz Piekut
Our inspiration was the Powiśle power plant, which is a perfect combination of steel and brick. We certainly wanted to maintain consistency, to make this project alive, not to contrast too much with each other. So that when people enter the plot, using the new facility, they feel such peace, security and simply that they are in their surroundings
- says Mateusz Radkiewicz.
"New concept of the old Tarbut school" competition.
photo: Dariusz Piekut
Among the projects created were more and less traditional or futuristic solutions. However, the most important aspect of the new concepts, which was highlighted by the organizers of the competition, was their centric character.
The jury of the competition included the president of Lukanova Construction, Elena Lukanova, as well as the dean of the Faculty of Architecture at Bialystok University of Technology, Prof. Tatiana Misijuk, and vice-dean Adam Yakimovich, as well as architects from Meteor Architects: Bogdan and Anna Pszonak.
