Total Modernism. Mass Housing and Urbanism in Soviet Zaporizhzhia 1958–1985

A quiet rural town until World War I, Zaporizhzhia exploded into a major industrial centre in the 1920s following the con­struction of the Dnipro Hydroelectric Station.

This book looks at a later period in the history of what is now one of the largest cities in Ukraine, the 1950s to 1980s, when the focus in Soviet policy shifted from industrialisation to welfare and from production to consumption. In this respect, Zaporizhzhia may be seen as ‘a local model of the birth of a modern society’ – Soviet consumer society. Historian Pavlo Kravchuk and historian and graphic designer Mykhailo Mordovskoi skilfully combine text and images to show how this shift played out in urban planning, architecture, and, more importantly, the lives of ordinary Soviet citizens.

Prefabricated construction techniques enabled the rapid erection of districts of mass housing, giving ordinary people a small apartment of their own for the first time. With this came a need for consumer goods. At the same time, sitting in their new kitchens, people gained a modicum of privacy and a space in which to meet and discuss, away from the controlling eye of the state. The new Soviet apartment was ‘a place of leisure’, but also of dissidence – the beginning of the end of the regime.

About the Authors:

Pavlo Kravchuk is a Ukrainian architectural historian. Chief specialist in historical and cultural heritage at the Department of Culture and Tourism at Zaporizhzhia City Council. One of the founders of the Zaporizhzhia Museum of Architecture. Creative director of the digital portal Zaporizhzhia Heritage. Author and coordinator of 'Programmes for protecting cultural and historical monuments of Zaporizhzhia City for 2018-2022'. Editor of the Ukrainian-German publication Fragile Heritage: Architectural Modernism of the Ukrainian South and East: late 1950s-1980s (2023).

Mykhailo Mordovskoi is a Ukrainian historian and -designer. Head of the municipal museum network in Zaporizhzhia. Author of the permanent exhibition at the Zaporizhzhia Museum of Architecture. Holder of the Heritage Solidarity Fellowship for Ukraine from Europa Nostra, Global Heritage Fund, and ALIPH (2022). Curator of the Rethinking Space cultural centre - the first public space in Ukraine focused on understanding the events of the current Russian--Ukrainian war (2023).