In Liberec, tours of the house where architect Hubáček lived will begin next week

Liberec - In Liberec, guided tours of the unique prefabricated house designed and previously inhabited by architect Karel Hubáček will begin next week. The North Bohemian Museum intends to hold them every Tuesday evening throughout the summer until early October. Jiří Křížek, the museum director, informed ČTK about this.

"We will see, of course, how we manage this over the summer and what the interest will be. However, I expect it to be significant," Křížek said.

The regional museum has managed Hubáček's house in the Lidové sady park since the end of last year when the Liberec Region purchased it from the descendants of the famous architect. So far, the museum has made it accessible to interested parties virtually.

The planned guided tours are a complementary program to the exhibition that the museum is hosting in the small hall to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the birth of the creator of the hotel and transmitter on Ještěd. After its conclusion, Hubáček's house will be closed to the public again. "In October, we will end the tours, completely vacate the house, complete its structural and technical survey, and propose a future accessibility regime to the Liberec Region, which will require investment. The fencing is in an emergency state," Křížek stated. He anticipates that some permanent visitor program could be established in Hubáček's house from 2026.

The house will also have its own curator, which the museum will likely begin searching for in June. "He will be responsible for this house, which should become a documentation center for architecture in the future. It should not just be about this one outburst during the centennial celebration, but rather a place in the North Bohemian Museum where we will focus on the architecture of the Liberec Region and influential figures in architecture. This should start in the second half of this year," the museum director added.

Hubáček developed the design for "his" house in 1959 with Vlastimil Šed, Josef Patrman, and Václav Bůžek. Due to its bearing steel structure, the house was versatile, featuring a sliding wall between the bedrooms, allowing it to be used as a standalone unit, create duplexes, or row houses, and add another floor. However, the project of the simple modernist prefabricated cube was ahead of its time and ultimately unsuccessful, as people did not trust the new technology then. Thus, it remained only a prototype. In 1962, Hubáček moved in and spent the rest of his life in the house with his family. He gradually revealed weaknesses in the project, leading to alterations - the house was given cladding to reduce heat loss and also received a sloped roof.

Karel Hubáček, who passed away 13 years ago, was also professionally connected to Liberec. In the late 1960s, he was among the founders of the Association of Engineers and Architects in Liberec (Sial), which was able to respond to modern European trends during normalization and produced several prominent figures in Czech architecture. He is credited with numerous buildings. The current exhibition at the museum titled Karel Hubáček: The Known Unknown focuses on these works.