SARAJEVO YUGO TOUR

The Skenderija Sports and Cultural Center was opened by President Tito himself in 1969 and it was rewarded as the best architectural achievement in Yugoslavia that same year. As a multipurpose facility, it features a concert hall, an indoor arena, meeting areas, shops, restaurants, office space, and an art gallery. Especially its concert hall, House of Youth, became a cult place in the Sarajevo YU-rock scene. We stop here to explore the roots of Yugoslav rock music at the EX-YU Rock Center.

The neighborhood of Ciglane was designed to fulfill the socialist urban vision of making housing and important services immediately available to the working class. The ground level forms the basis of a self-sufficient community with easy access to cafés, restaurants, shops, schools, parks and public transport. An uphill funicular connects this ground level with uniquely terraced residential blocks. We stop here to explore the urban vision of Socialist Yugoslavia and take the retro funicular back in time.

The uptown neighborhoods of New Sarajevo form the modernist counterpart to the traditional downtown area of Baščaršija. Starting from Marindvor we find Sarajevo’s most significant modernist buildings by some of the main architects from the so-called “Sarajevo circle”: Juraj Neidhardt (Philosophical Faculty, Government and Parliament), Boris Magaš (History Museum) and Ivan Štraus (Holiday Inn, UNIS towers). We stop here to marvel at the concrete and glass around us, visit the History Museum and make a coffee stop at the Tito cafe.

Sarajevo hosting the 1984 Winter Olympics was among the most significant events in the history of Yugoslavia. Sarajevo received a boost of investments in architecture and winter sports infrastructure and exceeded in its role as host city. The Sarajevo Olympics were, furthermore, unique for not being boycotted by any state in a period of Cold War boycotts in Moscow 1980 and Los Angeles 1984. We will see the Zetra Olympic Hall and the Koševo Olympic station, where, if you dare, you can take the YUGO for a spin yourself.

The Sarajevo Spomenik is located on the lower slopes of Mount Trebević and commemorates the Partisan fighters and civilian victims who perished in the Sarajevo area during World War Two. We stop here for a deep dive into Yugoslav memorial culture, which commemorated war victims through a certain unifying narrative and hierarchy from civilian victims of fascism to fallen soldiers and national heroes with a central role for Marshall Tito.

Nestled amidst the pine forest of Mount Trebević are the remains of the impressive bobsled track of the 1984 Sarajevo Winter Olympics. This bobsled facility was innovative in design and construction as it could easily be turned into one large 1570m track or three smaller tracks depending on the competition. The track was designed to be not only functional and competitive, but also accessible and engaging for locals and spectators. We stop here for you to walk through the bobsled track.