“Klaipėda Wedding Palace – Microhistories of the City’s Architecture”, 2024
A lecture by Marija Drėmaitė
Ieva Simonaitytė Public Library, H. Manto g. 25
2024-09-28 16.30–17.00
In many Lithuanian cities the wedding palaces were built during the Soviet period. They stood out for their individual design, their ornateness, their synthesis of the arts and their distinctive, newly invented ceremonial traditions. The Klaipėda Civil Registry Palace, built in 1979–1980 to a design by the architect Ramūnas Kraniauskas, has original architecture characteristic of late modernism and brutalism. Its austere façades conceal a rich interior, lavished with luxurious materials, uniquely designed furniture, light fittings, sculptures, tapestries, stained glass and other artworks created by prominent artists of the time. Today this building raises questions that go beyond its architectural value. Delving into the microhistories of architectural heritage, the lecture will seek to open up several perspectives for reading the palace, interpreting the building not only as a space of a new secular ritual but also as one where folk traditions were transferred into the city.
Marija Drėmaitė
Marija Drėmaitė is a cultural and architectural historian, an author of books, an exhibition curator and a professor at the Faculty of History of Vilnius University. Her research focuses on the architecture, environment and legacy of modernity.