An open recruitment of participants in the three-year international cultural project "UREHERIT. Architects for Heritage in Ukraine: Recreating Identity and Memory” started in Lviv during a two-day conference.

“During the conference in Lviv, we launched an open recruitment of project participants. We are waiting for applications from Ukrainian professionals and communities about their desire to work in one or another working group,” said the initiator and coordinator of the project, member of the board of the Association of Architects of Lithuania Rūta Leitanaitė.

The three-year project UREHERIT aims to explore various topics related to the conservation and restoration of cultural heritage.

“Heritage is a catalyst for the future for any country, and even more so for Ukraine, which is now truly looking for restoration to rediscover and recreate its image and vision of the future,” UNESCO coordinator Chiara Dezzi Bardeschi noted at the opening of the conference.

Acting Minister of Culture and Information Policy Rostyslav Karandeyev emphasized that coordination and interaction with the international community is a key factor for Ukraine in building solutions and developing algorithms for assessing damage, as well as restoring and preserving cultural heritage.

The chairperson of the State Agency for Tourism Development, Maryana Oleskiv, is convinced that the issue of incentives for preserving heritage is extremely important, so that it is economically profitable for the owner to restore the monument.

“Tourism is one of the ways to ensure that the heritage for the owner is not a yoke, but a commercially successful project. For our part, we are thinking, for example, about upgrading the category of the hotel, which has carried out a full restoration of the historical building,” Oleskiv said.

“We view cultural heritage not only as something we must preserve, but also as a resource for the sustainable and democratic restoration of Ukraine, its cities and the country itself - economically, environmentally and culturally. Heritage brings communities together, gives a sense of place and national pride, and will help bring people home,” Leitanaitė said.

According to Ruth Schagemann, President of the Architects' Council of Europe (ACE), politicians must recognize the value of the entire heritage, and not just architectural monuments with protected status. As for the European experience, “good public procurement, good competition, transparent processes, participation of people, local society, and adaptation of rules” can help Ukrainians preserve their architectural heritage.

Among the main topics of UREHERIT are the assessment of war damage to cultural heritage; criteria and methods for assessing the value of heritage; public participation in the restoration of cultural heritage; architectural competitions; comprehensive renovation of modern housing; technology and innovation in restoration projects, etc.

At this stage of the project, the current situation and needs of Ukraine as a whole and individual cities are being assessed. The results of the analysis and a detailed plan for the areas will be presented at the next conference in Stockholm in May 2024.

More than 300 professionals took part in the conference in Lviv, during which the first developments, program concepts and even investment projects were presented.

President of the National Union of Architects of Ukraine Oleksandr Chyzhevsky emphasized that it is extremely important to introduce the significance of cultural heritage into the general consciousness. He sees the implementation of the project’s developments in vocational education as the key task.

Work is already underway on two educational programs - for students and certified architects. For students, an educational program on the topic of reviving cultural heritage as a resource for sustainable transformation will be developed by the Kharkiv School of Architecture, advanced training programs for professionals are being developed by the National Union of Architects of Ukraine and Swedish architects.

As reported, the international cultural project "UREHERIT. Architects for Heritage in Ukraine: Recreating Identity and Memory" was initiated by the Association of Architects of Lithuania. It is co-financed under the European Union's Creative Europe program for EUR1 million (project code 101121502 - U-RE-HERIT) and is implemented by a consortium of 11 professional organizations from nine countries.