The court rejected the appeal of the National Library in the competition for its building

Brno - The Supreme Court rejected the appeal of the National Library, which disagreed with the final judgment regarding the competition for its new building. The selection of the winning project by Jan Kaplický was contested ten years ago by the studio HXH architekti (formerly HŠH architekti). According to them, Kaplický's design, which was not ultimately realized, was chosen in violation of the assignment, a claim acknowledged by the appellate court in November two years ago, which ordered the library to pay three million crowns in compensation. This was reported today by Czech Television.

The information about the Supreme Court's decision was confirmed by spokesperson Alena Novotná from the District Court for Prague 1, as reported by ČT.

According to the appellate court, the National Library should have disqualified Kaplický's proposal because it did not meet the competition conditions and should have paid the studio HXH the difference between the reward for third and second place. The then studio HŠH finished third in the competition, and according to the court's decision, the library had to pay 1.6 million crowns along with interest and legal costs. The management of the National Library deemed this an absurd procedure, claiming that the Czech court has no right to change the ranking determined by an independent expert commission.

The results of the closely watched competition were announced in March 2007 in the personal presence of its winner, the architect Kaplický, who resides in Britain. However, his design or any other was not realized after months of politicized debates. The HŠH studio filed a lawsuit a few months after the results were announced. They argued, among other things, that one of the competition conditions required placing the National Conservation Fund above ground, which Kaplický's design did not fulfill.

Vlastimil Ježek, who as the then director of the NK announced the international architectural competition and led the institution at the time of the announcement of its results, repeatedly stated that even if Kaplický's proposal had been disqualified, it would not have automatically led to changes in the amount of the awarded prizes. According to him, Kaplický came up with a solution that neither the competition's clients, the librarians, nor the jury composed of experts could conceive as safe.