Zlín is a city that must be discovered and explored. It may not be love at first sight, but it will be love. Zlín is a city made for strolling. But you have to walk with your eyes open and with a desire to look around. That’s the only way you’ll begin to see the interesting story that’s written here in every brick.
Baťa – this is more than merely Tomáš Baťa the founder, his half-brother Jan Antonín, and his son Tomáš; it’s also his collaborators, namely Dominik Čipera, Hugo Vavrečka, and architects František Lýdie Gahura, Vladimír Karfík and Jan Kotěra. Baťa is not merely a surname or a shoe brand. It’s a philosophy of life, a symbol of entrepreneurship, innovative ideas, perseverance, determination, efficiency, productivity, and life in its purest form.
Experience Zlín. At least for a day, or perhaps even a weekend.
The Tomáš Baťa Villa
Gahurova 292, Zlín
Architect: Jan Kotěra
The villa of Mr and Mrs Baťa is one of the most important historical monuments in Zlín. Baťa had it built as his family residence in 1907–1912 based on a design by the architect Jan Kotěra. The villa’s ground floor was used not just for family life, but also for social events. It additionally included the industrialist’s office, which is located next to the villa’s entrance door. The villa experienced its worst years after 1950, when it was nationalized and converted into a clubhouse for young “Pioneers” – the Soviets’ answer to Scouts. After it was returned to T. Baťa’s son, it underwent extensive renovation and was largely returned to its original form.
Today the villa is the home of the Tomáš Baťa Foundation, thanks to which it is now open to the public. You can come for guided tours, workshops or other social events. You can also explore its freely accessible garden.
Interesting fact: Tomáš Baťa wanted every room to have a view of the factory. But his wife Marie intervened and told the architect: “Yes, make windows everywhere… except the bedroom”.
Near Baťa’s villa you can see Baťa-themed street-art decoration of the pedestrian underpass.
It depicts Tomáš Baťa, his wife Marie, Tomáš Baťa Jr. and their Zlín villa. The other themes depicted here are:
Jan A. Baťa, Dominik Čipera, Hugo Vavrečka, a community of Baťa houses, the factory and the Tomáš Baťa Memorial along with a Junkers aeroplane. You’ll also see iconic Baťa slogans and shoes.
The “Baťa Skyscraper” (administrative building No. 21)
Třída Tomáše Bati 21, Zlín
Architect: Vladimír Karfík
An observation deck with a café, the mobile office of J. A. Baťa in the lift, the highest paternoster in the Czech Republic.
This legendary 77.5 m high building was built in 1936–1938 as the headquarters of the Baťa company. In its day, it was the second tallest building in Europe, and it was equipped with timeless technologies. Ahead of its time it had a central air-conditioning unit, window-cleaning and façade-repair cable car designed in-house, a high-speed lift and a paternoster.
The mobile director’s office located in the building’s lift is a technical rarity that’s unparalleled in the world. It is equipped with office furniture, air conditioning, a telephone line and a washbasin with hot and cold water.
TIP: At the Museum of Southeast Moravia, you can book a guided tour including a ride in Jan A. Baťa’s unique lift and enjoy the view of Zlín from the observation deck.
Interesting fact: With a height of over 77 metres, building No. 21 is the highest observation point in the region. The terrace on the 16th floor is open to the public daily from 8 am to 9 pm. There are telescopes on the terrace as well as a bronze model of the city, which shows what it looked like in the 1950s – the height of the Baťa period.
The factory complex
Part of the city’s conservation zone. The beating heart of this city, which will enchant you with its atmosphere. Here you’ll find galleries, cafés and shops.
“In Zlín, you can see and feel the passionate ‘cult of work’ everywhere. The Baťa factories are truly a colossus. They are a city within a city, a labyrinth, or if you like: ‘America’.”
In 1924, the architect F. L. Gahura submitted a city-planning project named “Factory in the Gardens”, and Tomáš Baťa built a large industrial complex based upon it. It grew to a size of 70 hectares and was filled with the red-brick factory buildings with concrete frames that are so typical for Baťa’s Zlín. Baťa’s “magic” dimension of 6.15 m – which is the standardised distance from one load-bearing column of a building to another – is at work here. Gahura surrounded the buildings with grassy areas, greenery and trees.
In the Baťa era, this site was fenced off and gated, with only employees being allowed to come in through the entrance gates. Today, much of the site is freely accessible, and it offers shops, cafés and a gallery. To more easily navigate the factory grounds, you should know that the individual buildings received their numbering already before the war based on the American model – the first digit is based on the columns from the direction from the city centre, while the second one indicates the number of the row.
Interesting fact: Not all of the original buildings on the site have survived. Some were destroyed during the bombing of Zlín, and some buildings with disrupted structural stability were demolished. Thanks to this, the massive building No. 34 – the former central shoe warehouse – is now clearly visible. Production went out from the factory grounds to here via cable cars, and then the boxes of shoes were loaded from the ground floor into vehicles or railway carriages.
Zlín – a city in the gardens
To get to know the architecture of Zlín, use the Zlín Architectural Manual, guided walks with local ZÓNA ZLÍN guides or the Baťa Zlín mobile app.
In 1926, Tomáš Baťa, who had been serving as the mayor of Zlín since 1923, announced a programme to build up Zlín as a garden city. The architect František Lýdie Gahura drew up the urban planning concepts for this. Zlín changed very quickly as a result. It began losing its appearance as a rural town and taking on the appearance of a modern greenery-filled industrial city. Gahura, who was appointed, city architect in the 1930s, finalised his work on the zoning development of Zlín in 1934 with the “Greater Zlín Regulatory Plan”, the continuity of which is still maintained today.
Even at present, Zlín benefits from Gahura’s generous architectural concept, which ensures that its urban development and surrounding countryside form a harmonious whole. The interlinking of the city’s parks, public spaces and buildings makes Zlín a truly extraordinary green city. The proof here is the Komenského Park in the city centre, which has become the vibrant heart of the city, a place of relaxation and a literal playground for children.
This is visible not only in “Baťa’s” traditional built-up areas, but also in the Jižní Svahy housing estate, the construction of which began in the 1970s. This part of the city is also planted with greenery, with its own central park and recreation areas, and it has a natural connection to the surrounding forests.
THE LETNÁ NEIGHBOURHOOD
Want a taste of the quintessential Zlín? Then take a walk among Letná. This quarter was founded in 1918, when houses for employees were built here according to a design by the architect Jan Kotěra. It was later gradually expanded with characteristic cubical rustic-brick houses, designed by the architect F. L. Gahura.
TIP: The place where you can find out everything about the Baťa houses and the entire elaborate housing system is the Baťa Housing Infopoint on Nad Ovčírnou Street.
Gahura Avenue
Today’s TGM Square – locally nicknamed “Gahura Avenue” – was designed as a green compositional axis of the city centre, flanked by dormitories and schools. Its purpose was simple: it was to serve as a resting and meeting place for workers from the factory that stood just a few dozen metres away. Gahura, who was well versed in matters of planned cities and functionalist architecture, designed it as a green belt which was to flow freely into the neighbouring forest in its upper part and to connect with the city parks of Zlín in its lower part, closer to the city centre. When Tomáš Baťa died in a plane crash in 1932, Gahura designed a memorial at the top of the avenue, which symbolically crowned the whole area.
14|15 BAŤA INSTITUTE
Vavrečkova 7040, Zlín
Museum of Southeast Moravia
Regional Gallery of Fine Arts
František Bartoš Regional Library
The author of the architectural design for the original buildings is the Baťa architect Jiří Voženílek, while the men behind their modern form are the architects Juraj Sonlajtner and Jakub Obůrka.
Thanks to a successful renovation, the pair of original factory buildings No. 14 and 15 has been connected into a single place where you can piece together the puzzle of Zlín. The 14/15 Baťa Institute brings together the Museum of Southeast Moravia, the Regional Gallery of Fine Arts, the František Bartoš Regional Library, and the Regional Tourist Information Centre.
“The Baťa Principle” Exhibition
The permanent museum exhibition entitled “The Baťa Principle – Today’s Fantasy, Tomorrow’s Reality” clearly illustrates the entire story of Baťa’s business. Here you can see how the Baťa company functioned and learn about its working principles, social and health policy, education, leisure, transport and trade. There’s also a historical shoemaker’s workshop and the famous Baťa “circle” – a demonstration of the machine production of shoes with high labour productivity. Here you can understand how, under the leadership of Tomáš Baťa, the shoemaking craft became an industry. The exhibition’s collection of shoes from all over the world, which is the largest in Europe and the second largest in the world, is also a great experience.
In a separate section, you’ll discover the history of film production in the Zlín film studios, which were founded by Tomáš Baťa in 1936.
All this is complemented by a unique exhibition dedicated to Jiří Hanzelka and Miroslav Zikmund, a nationally famous travelling, writing and filmmaking duo, who gained a base in Zlín for their expeditions and who are inseparably linked to the city. A silver Tatra 87 is another highlight here. Photographs, film clips, and various three-dimensional exhibits document both of the great journeys of the legendary travellers Hanzelka and Zikmund.
Interesting fact: When you’re on the platform between buildings No. 14 and 15, notice the conveyor belt suspended on the upper floors of both buildings. Originally, all the production buildings were connected by an ingenious cableway system. Both semi-finished and finished products were moved by air, the roads were mainly for pedestrians and there were very few cars.
The neighbouring building No. 13 is the oldest preserved building on the site. Externally it looks like the other buildings, but the curves and texture of the original brickwork are evident in the internal layout. This is most visible in the interior of the ground floor of the building.
The Tomáš Baťa Memorial
T. G. Masaryka Square 2570, Zlín
A pearl of functionalist architecture
Architect: František Lýdie Gahura
The Tomáš Baťa Memorial is the crowning achievement of Zlín’s functionalist architecture and is considered an architectural icon whose significance transcends the borders of the Czech Republic. This memorial was built in a mere four months to be opened exactly one year after Tomáš Baťa’s tragic plane crash. The author of this extraordinary 1933 construction is František Lýdie Gahura, who imprinted the building with a defined set of Baťa’s qualities: flair, optimism, brightness, generosity and simplicity. The purpose of the Memorial is ideological. Nevertheless, the building is based on the standards of Baťa’s architecture. Unlike in the factory buildings, the architect used only three materials for the memorial: iron, glass and concrete. This is why the memorial can rightly be described as the boldest building in Zlín.
The restored Tomáš Baťa Memorial has been open to the public again in its original form since May 2019. Visitors can expect an extraordinary experience, enhanced by a faithful replica of Baťa’s Junkers F-13 aircraft, which is ingeniously installed in such a way as to create the impression of a machine stopped in flight. A staircase in the shape of the letter Z, symbolizing Zlín, is another unique element of the interior.
This heritage site can be visited all year round as a guided tour. Tickets can be purchased at the T. Baťa Memorial Info Point, located in the adjacent secondary school building (at nám. T. G. Masaryka 2734) and online at www.pamatnikbata.eu.
The Forest Cemetery
Filmová 412, Zlín – Kudlov
Architect: František Lýdie Gahura
Tomáš Baťa’s Tomb
An architecturally unique cemetery designed as a forest park.
THE FOREST CEMETERY IS A MUST-SEE WHEN VISITING ZLÍN. THIS IS A PLACE WITH A POWERFUL STORY.
This site was built up by Tomáš Baťa in the 1930s as a final resting place for Zlín citizens in the middle of a mature forest. With an area of 20 hectares, it is almost 40 times larger than the original Zlín cemetery.
The main idea was to create a cemetery that would be far from the industrial bustle and the rapidly developing city, and at the same time able to resolve the issue of burials for at least the next 100 years. It was designed as a truly communal burial ground, where the deceased would be buried regardless of their religion. The natural environment was also to be preserved as much as possible, and the character of all artistic elements, especially the monuments, was to be subordinated to the idea of blending in with nature – they were not to be ostentatious, massive or made of conspicuous materials.
Tomáš Baťa once said: “We’ve come to perceive the cemetery as a place where one must go to mourn. But a cemetery, like all things in the world, is meant to serve life. That’s why it should be a place that does not frighten; it should be visited by the living in a spirit of peace and joy.”
The work on this project was entrusted to the architect František Lýdie Gahura and also to MUDr. Rudolf Gerbec, who was a close associate of Tomáš Baťa. The cemetery was completed in 1932. Ironically, the first person to be buried here was medical student Rudolf Gerbec, the son of the cemetery’s founder; he was soon followed by Tomáš Baťa and his pilot Jindřich Brouček, who tragically died in a plane crash on 12 July 1932. The gravestones of Tomáš Baťa, the pilot Brouček and other members of the Baťa family were created by the architect F. L. Gahura. He also has his own final resting place in the Forest Cemetery, along with a number of other personalities associated with Zlín, such as film directors Hermína Týrlová and Karel Zeman.