The architect Machoň significantly influenced the shape of the center of Pardubice

Pardubice - No other architect has influenced the appearance of the center of Pardubice as much as Ladislav Machoň. In the first half of the 20th century, he designed five public buildings, one square, and one commercial object for the city. His most famous work is the passage first opened in 1925, which now bears Machoň's name and was ceremoniously opened today after nearly two years of renovations. The architect, who was imprisoned in the 1950s, died 40 years ago.
     As his first building, Machoň designed the headquarters of the Post and Telegraph Office on Jahnova Avenue in Pardubice, which is now owned by the region. It is one of his most beautiful functionalist buildings. Construction of the building began in 1924.
     Machoň also conceived the form of Smetanovo Square and designed the nearby State Real Gymnasium, which now houses the secondary school of electrotechnics. Its construction began in 1925 and students moved there four years later. The building features spacious classrooms, tiered lecture halls like those at universities, and wide corridors.
     Machoň's projects also include the buildings of the court and tax offices. Currently, they are used by the chemical industry secondary school and the district court. On Míru Street, Machoň has, in addition to the passage, a post office building where the postal service still operates today. It was built in 1935. Machoň reduced his design for the telephone exchange in Prague's Letná in Pardubice.
     The passage was commissioned by two local entrepreneurs and cost them 1.6 million crowns at the time. Initially, they only wished for a regular apartment building with shops on the ground floor. Later, they felt this would be a less profitable venture, so Machoň designed the passage for them in the style of Parisian shopping centers. The 50-meter long passage, brightened by neon signs, was decorated in the spirit of fading decorativism.
     Ladislav Machoň was born in 1888 in Prague. He was a representative of modern classicism and functionalism. In Prague, he designed, among other things, the reconstruction of the Clementinum and the Straka Academy or the completion of the Faculty of Law. The Čapek brothers also chose Machoň to draw a double villa for them. The architect was active in the resistance during World War II and was imprisoned for political reasons in the 1950s. Machoň died in Prague in 1973.