Health Factories

Slava Savova worked as an architect until 2019, but gradually turned her attention to research, and today we know her for her work on the history and the plans for future development of Bulgarian spas and mineral baths. In 2020, she met another architect, Maya Shopova, and the two agreed that there was a lack of in-depth research on this subject, and that it would be great to come up with a joint project focusing on the heritage of the thermal springs in Bulgaria. Three weeks after the two first met, Sofiaplan announced a public discussion of the brief for a competition for the Sofia Central Baths, and the two immediately decided to get involved. Thus, the Sofiiski Termi (Sofia Thermal Baths) team was born, bringing together 16 specialists from different fields. Meanwhile, Slava dedicated herself to theoretical research in the field of medical anthropology.She took us on a walk through the past, present and future of Bulgaria's spas and springs.

Hisar, the Trade Union Rest Home. Bulgarian Resorts, 1961.

A journey through the springs

At the end of 2020, thanks to a small grant from the National Culture Fund, I started doing research on the mineral baths and springs in southeastern Bulgaria, moving to Sliven and then Stara Zagora. For five and a half months I traveled almost daily to different "bathing" spots in the region, and thus had the opportunity to conduct fieldwork and also to collect data for my subsequent work. Perhaps the most important part of this process was the interviews and informal conversations with people from communities in that region who helped me in all sorts of ways. (The project is still ongoing under the name "Palaces of Health.") Some of this research formed the basis for my current research at BAS, which I hope to continue working on over the next two and a half years. My focus is on the network of spas built between the 1950s and 1980s in the context of national and international health policies.

Bath transformations

Hot mineral springs have undergone transformations and served various functions over time, from the sacred to the utilitarian, social and medicinal. These are not necessarily monolithic roles that correspond to specific time periods. Rather, they coexist in the same places, and this often gave rise to conflicts. A good example of this would be the mineral spring in the center of Sofia where shrines, temples and water-cure centers were built over the centuries, as well as baths serving hygienic needs, laundries and tanneries, all connected to the spring by various water networks. At the beginning of the 20th century, one of the ongoing debates in the Sofia city municipal government was whether the mineral waters should be used for hygiene or for healing, with the former taking precedence in the final design of the Central Mineral Bath. Today, if the mineral spring were accessible (only 1/5th of its water flow is available for public use), there would probably be a conflict between its economic and health benefits, between providing a recreational experience and accessible therapeutic procedures.

The sanatorium in Pavel Banya. Bulgarian resorts 1961.

The need for a public bathhouse has not disappeared either, and in the past year the energy value of the hydrothermal resource has also come to the fore, in the context of the energy crisis resulting from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The changing, multi-layered significance of this natural resource for communities in the region has both social and economic dimensions that might not be able to coexist without some friction in the contemporary context. Therefore, the guiding principle for future access to this resource ought to be the improvement of the lives of as many people as possible, rather than a select few, so that the commons serve the common good.

The Sapareva Banya sanatorium. Bulgarian resorts 1961.

The palaces of health

In the post-war period, balneotherapy became an important tool of the health policy of the Bulgarian socialist state. In the 1950s and 1960s, the number of new medical and recreational facilities near mineral springs expanded considerably. The typology of health resorts – "palaces of health" or "health factories" – first appeared. A large part of the population could now access prolonged medicinal stays at these facilities, in which the recovery process took the form of a strict sequence of curative treatments, standardized amounts of rest, specific diets and therapeutic exercise. The new sanatoriums functioned as small hospitals equipped with specialized rooms and laboratories, while the old baths provided therapeutic water procedures but also retained their central hygienic purpose.

Bathers in front of the baths' ticket office. Central State Archives, F. 399, op. 1, a.f. 1, l. 29

What is remarkable about this period is how health and social policy followed the hydrogeological map of the country: thermal springs turned into powerful actors that drew a new geographic map of healing and also contributed to new regional policies. However, these processes ought to be analyzed in light of the country's economic policies and its course towards intensive industrialization, with a special emphasis on heavy industry. “The production of the means of production" relies on intensive extraction of human labor, which must be secured with proper care for the "labor resources."

What comes next?

Our conservation efforts should be directed toward more than just the restoration of the beautiful, old, ornamented buildings of the baths, which we acknowledge as precious cultural and historical heritage. The culture of public baths and accessing mineral water resources, which exists throughout Bulgaria in various forms, some of them quite informal, must also be preserved. The makeshift pools at the Zheleznitsa springs, for example, do not need expensive renovations to become an appealing tourist site. They merely need discreet care that shows that the presence of people at the springs is not in conflict with the environment. There is no famous bathhouse at Korten. But the bath there is used by local villagers and by travelers who go there because the water makes them feel much better. The village needs working public fountains, a well-maintained park and sports facilities, and the abandoned hotel facilities could be restored in order to revitalize this lovely place near the Tundzha river. In other words, our care for the mineral springs and healing waters must cover all aspects of its use if we want them to be truly accessible to the public.

A restoration of the former men's bath. Photo: Ivan Genov

The Sofia Baths team

We put the team together so we could participate in the open call for a concept plan for the east and north wings of the Central Mineral Baths. Within eight months we had prepared a concept for the restoration of the building. Our project proposes to restore the social role of the building as a mediator between people and water, and seeks to balance the preservation of architectural heritage and the use of the thermal resource. We propose three approaches to conservation – explicit restoration, which recreates and reinterprets the original appearance of the building, minimal intervention, in which the historic layers of the building are preserved, and the palimpsest, a contrastive creative intervention. These approaches are applied to different parts of the building and relate to the history of its transformations, which we have traced using archival documents. Our concept proposes a possible future for the building, and we support the restoration of its use as a bath with a concrete plan for implementation. Our recommendation to the Sofia Municipality for next steps in this project is to hold an international architectural competition in which established architects and firms with contemporary practices can participate.

Hotel in Voneshta Voda. Photo.

The future of the Central Mineral Baths

Last year, together with the Bulgarian Thermal Heritage Association and the Historical Baths team, we drafted an open letter regarding a proposal to cancel the results of the Open call for the preparation of a new restoration plan that would prioritize the interest of a concessionaire. The hypothetical plan provides for a one hundred percent concession of the space and an architectural competition organized by the concessionaire. We cannot support such a proposal, especially since it involves public infrastructure built with public funds. Our arguments have been laid out in an open letter, and we have not yet been informed of any developments in this case.

Slava Savova's project "Palaces of Health" is at palacesofhealth.com