CREATIVITY GAME

Tomaž Pipan¹, Neja Zalaznik²:

Architectural landscapes and regions of Slovenia and contemporary urbanization: a selection of representative settlements

DOI 10.15292/IU-CG.2025.13.022-029 | UDK 711.2:911.375.1(497.4) | SUBMITTED: 10/2025 | REVISED: 11/2025 | PUBLISHED: 12/2025
Author's affiliation: ¹ University of Ljubljana, Biotechnical Faculty, Slovenia, ² Univerza v Ljubljani, Biotehnična fakulteta, Slovenija

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ABSTRACT
The article presents a method for selecting settlements suitable for further evaluation of the spatial identity of contemporary settlements in Slovenia. The starting point is that the identity of settlements can no longer be understood solely on the basis of historic classifications, but as a combination of historical, post-war and contemporary settlement layers. Thus, the aim of this paper is to identify a set of four settlements in each architectural region of Slovenia that are large enough and have an appropriate ratio between historical and new fabric, so that it is possible to define the impact of new fabric on the historic identity of the settlements. The selection is based on setting thresholds and overlapping three maps: (1) Map of settlement fabric increase ratio, which separates new from historical fabric using the year 1945; (2) Map of settlement size by population, which provide suitability of the settlements of analysis; and (3) Map of distance from the highway, which identifies areas of development pressures. The results show that the thresholds for selecting settlements had to be adjusted most significantly for the Map of settlement fabric increase, which indicates a large regional heterogeneity of the settlement pattern. The Map of distance from the highway turns out to be less useful, as most of the suitable settlement sizes are within the first isochrone. The Map of settlement size by population shows a fairly even distribution of rural settlements. The overlapping of these maps with set thresholds leads to a set of 52 settlements. The key conclusion is that settlements where identity can still be interpreted mainly through historical structure are generally smaller than 500 inhabitants and that it is difficult to select 4 settlements in each region that would correspond to the initial thresholds. The share of new growth in the building fabric in Slovenia in rural settlements of suitable size is higher than expected, which will make determining the identity of contemporary settlements difficult.

KEYWORDS
settlement pattern, morphology, architectural landscapes and regions of Slovenia, contemporary settlements

FULL ARTICLE
https://iu-cg.org/paper/2025/IU-CG.2025.13.022-029.pdf (0.77 MB)

CITATION

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