City under (re)construction: Architectural narrations as a foundation story of a city with a broken cultural continuity

Summary Using the fate of the Polish city of Wrocław as an example, I present the role of architectural reconstruction/renovation in building the identity of a city with broken structures of long duration. The emergence of Wrocław after the Second World from the ruins of the German city of Breslau was one of the most prominent urban social experiments in European history. However, due to the purely political context of the city’s birth, Wrocław residents still cope with the issue of having no ties to the city’s foreign architectural fabric. In this study, I analyse the elite’s narrative practices, whose aim is to create a sense of identification of people with the city. I discuss the above issue in detail using the example of the renovation of Wrocław Market Square (1995–1997). As viewed by the elite, the renovation of the Market Square gave the city a high position among European cities. However, as I show on the basis of the collected empirical material – thirty in-depth interviews, ordinary city residents regard the Market Square simply as a tourist-attractive space – mostly in its consumer dimension: a pleasing background for dining. The story told by the elites about the Market Square, which was supposed to “start new thinking about the whole city” and “create perspectives”, completely misses the narratives of residents about this part of the city.