Nowa Huta: Poland’s forgotten attempt at a socialist utopia

The most ambitious new town ever built is now a rundown district of Krakow. Mick O’Hare travels east to find out what happened​ to this ‘workers’ paradise’

Planned streets and utilitarian architecture in Nowa Huta (iStock)

Postwar Britain got Basildon, Hemel Hempstead, Runcorn, Milton Keynes, Cwmbran and East Kilbride. But Poland got Nowa Huta.

Born of the same era that gave Britain the NHS and the modern welfare state, the New Towns Act of 1946 was an ambitious programme of community planning.

These new towns would be a remedy for overcrowding in large, industrialised cities, prevent the seemingly endless outward growth of London and, crucially, provide homes for those lost to wartime bombing and fire. It was called planning the peace.