Historic buildings, their conservation and management
A thousand years of cultivation of the landscape and the development of architecture, town planning, art, technology and industry has filled the Czech lands with an incredible wealth of cultural monuments. They are testimony to the turbulent history and amazing creativeness of the nations for whom the country became home.
Above all, they enrich the present day: they play an important part in the Czech landscape, they give towns and villages their unforgettable appearance and thy fill the interiors of churches, castles, mansions and other historic buildings with valuable furnishings and collections. They are often a symbol of Czech statehood, and make a significant contribution to feelings of national identity and community.
Historical monuments fulfil a wide range of cultural, educational and other useful functions, and thus contribute to the life and economic development of the country’s regions. Together with live culture, they act like nothing else to create an attractive picture of the Czech Republic abroad, leading to knowledge exchange and mutual cultural enrichment between nations.
Social awareness of the valuable and irreplaceable role played by historic buildings in contemporary life is growing with time. It is thus an honourable and highly moral obligation to preserve them for future generations. Experience shows that the only guaranteed and permanently sustainable way to achieve this goal is to use monuments in such a way as to take into balanced account the needs and aims of their owners, while at the same time preserving, in the public interest, their cultural values.
This is a complex and highly demanding progress. Heritage conservation needs a high level of expert knowledge that draws on and integrates findings from a number of research areas. It also needs a good knowledge of contemporary life and work, and also of how to communicate convincingly with the public.
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The many types of heritage conservation officer
“We wanted to do it differently, but the conservation officers wouldn’t allow us…“ Most people have heard this type of lament, but not everyone knows just who conservation officers are. They are not always employees of the National Heritage Institute – the term is often used for employees of local councils. This is because decisions are made in two steps: the National Heritage Institute (or, more precisely, one of its regional specialist branches) draws up an expert opinion on the specific case or application, which it then sends to the relevant local administrative body with decision-making competences (a municipality with extended powers, or in the case of larger towns and cities, the city hall or regional office) to aid it in its decision. Put simply, the specialist branches of the National Heritage Institute evaluate, advise and recommend, but it is the council that issues a decision for or against, with an official stamp. The highest instance over all of them is the Ministry of Culture.