Modern Mokotów / BBGK Architekci

The New Face of Służewiec Przemysłowy - Służewiec Przemysłowy, part of Warsaw's Mokotów district, is a place which, over the course of just under a century, has become the site of three successive spatial monocultures. In the 1950s, the pre-war agricultural land began to give way to the factories and industrial facilities of the Southern Industrial and Warehousing District, only to make way once more in the 1990s – this time for a new office district. At that time, it was a space intended to realise the visions of the early era of Polish capitalism regarding a modern, metropolitan business district, with new forms of architecture corresponding to new forms of work. This single-purpose district, dominated by hundreds of thousands of square metres of office space, came to be commonly referred to by Warsaw residents as 'Mordor': an unwelcoming space, operating to the dictates of a rhythm of life dictated by office working hours, gridlocked during rush hour and coming to a standstill after 5 pm.