DISTINCTIVE FACADES OF COMMERCIAL BUILDINGS AND THE QUALITY OF PUBLIC SPACE

Mutual relations between the retail center and public spaces of the city are varied. They depend on the type and size of the commercial structure. Other ones are for multifunctional shopping centers and other for high streets. In megastores and shopping malls the essential for their functioning is their interior and entrance, which is sometimes the only place of interpenetration of the commercial structure with the surrounding public space. The facades of these buildings due to their size and limited access of natural light, caused by technological and commercial limitation make the problem for composition and form a barrier between the interior of the mall and the surrounding public space. In the area of shopping streets, we may talk about specific integration of public space and individual shops through their shops windows and entrance. However, from the nineteenth century onwards in commercial architecture appeared the elevations having a distinctive architectural elements in the frontages shopping streets. These are the facades of drawing the attention with innovative solutions compositional, structural and material. In the twenty-first century in Europe there are commercial buildings, which by its uniqueness is not only factor of trading brand identification, but also become architectural icons. They chart new directions in shaping facades. The study was based on literature on the subject, data featured on websites and own materials collected during study trips, such as inventories, drawings and photographs. The thesis was put that the unique facades of modern commercial facilities become identifiers of public space in which they are placed. The analysis embraces building Prada in Tokyo, Glass Farm in Schijndel, shopping center Grand Sud Waves of Metz and Markthal in Rotterdam. It has been shown that the uniqueness of elevation solutions affect: 1 / way of shaping public spaces in the vicinity of a commercial facility; 2 / the diversity of merging areas of trade and public space; 3 / identifying a location of the object as a distinguishing feature of the public space.