Wayfinding system
in Giszowiec
Katowice, Poland
The Giszowiec district in Katowice is famous for its unique workers' colony bulidings, built in 1906-1910 for workers and their families - mainly from the Giesche mine. The colony was designed by Emil and Georg Zillmann, who wanted to implement there an idea of the "city – garden". Each family had it own green area and could use it for private purposes. There were gardens and toilets near the houses, and on the streets - hydrants. The residents were served by e.g. a tavern, ice factory, bakeries, shops, canteen, dining room, bathhouse, laundry or mangle. Some of theses residential houses and public buildings have been preserved until today.
Today, the centre of Giszowiec is also full of green. The buildings of the forest inspectorate, schools and shops and the workers' houses themselves are also interesting. To the west of the center of the estate a neo-Baroque director's villa has been preserved. The unique architecture of Giszowiec "played" in many movies, including Polish classic: "Paciorki jednego różańca" by Kazimierz Kuc.
That's why the City Council of Katowice decided to prepare a properly marked walking route in the district and we had a pleasure to prepare a wayfinding system for it. Each point on the walking route is marked with a unique information carrier with a "window" through which you can see the monument or its characteristic fragment in the best perspective. This is a clear reference to a characteristic element of many buildings there - tiny windows through which one would like to look inside. The shape, proportions and colours of the carriers are also not random. Here you can also find references to the surrounding architecture (e.g. the colour ratio of typical residential buildings: always white, with red roofs). Thanks to these, we managed to fit into the surrounding landscape.
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Design: Blank Studio
Aleksandra Krupa, Bartłomiej Witański,
Martyna Berger, Justyna Batko
Font used: Chamber Sans Pro
Year of project: 2019
Year of implementation: 2020
Year of implementation: 2020
Photo credits: Michał Jędrzejowski
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