With the population of 300.000 inhabitants, Kaunas city has over 60 museums and galleries, more than 10 professional theatres, various cultural facilities, 8 active art unions and holds over 60 representative festivals and events.
Kaunas is renowned for its unique school of architecture. In the swirl of European events, the city’s “golden age” (1918–1940) was marked by the interwar modernism architecture: its dense concentration in the city centre, a distinctive Lithuanian style of interior, exterior and furniture design, which is a unique phenomenon not only in Lithuania, but also in Europe.
The key engines of Kaunas city architecture, design and urbanism are the following festivals: Kaunas Biennial, International Kaunas Architecture Festival and the Design Week that is organized throughout Lithuania at the same time. The festivals were created by professionals from various fields of cultural industries (arts, architecture, design, technologies, business) in terms of international cooperation and promotion of diversity of cultural expressions. The Architecture and Urbanism Research Centre of Kaunas University of Technology conducts scientific studies, while architects’ studios and design-driven creative hubs integrate the tradition into the modern reality. It is especially significant for the preservation and development of outstanding Kaunas architecture.
