The Skopje Project—Building the “World City”

In 1966, the United Nations completed the large scale programme of assistance to the City of Skopje, the purpose of which was to assist the local authorities in drawing up a new city plan for its future development after the devastating earthquake in 1963 that left 80% of the city in ruins. Following this idea, a number of world architects were invited in Skopje, including Kenzo Tange from Japan, Jaap Bakema and J.H. Van den Broek from Holland and Constantinos Doxiadis from Greece, to contribute to this effort with their ideas, plans and designs. It was anticipated that once the reconstruction would be completed, and given the engagement of such eminent designers, the city would provide solutions to the contemporary “urban crisis”. However, sixty years after the adoption of urban plan for the City of Skopje, the legacy of this international project led by UN remains relatively unattained. Revisiting the idea of the power of architecture and urban design as the drivers of reconstruction of the societies and cities the paper explores the contexts and networks of political and institutional actors that enabled and led to such an ambitious international project, mapping the theories and urban concepts that were in the foreground of the main project proposals and draws conclusions that will lead toward better understanding of the capacity of contemporary architecture to exercise and work with concepts of solidarity, just society and urban reconstruction.