Physiognomic implications of the second home phenomenon in the receiving settlements – the case study of Malinska on the Island of Krk

• Main Author: Vuk Tvrtko Opačić
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Zadar 2009-01-01
• Series: Geoadria
• Online Access: http://hrcak.srce.hr/file/68348

In the past fifty years the second home phenomenon has become one of the most distinguished geographical features in the Croatian littoral. After Croatia won its independence and after the cessation of war operations, with the start of the period of apartmentalisation, secondary dwelling emerged as the dominant factor in landscape definition in many settlements of the Croatian littoral in the past ten to fifteen years. In the settlements which recorded most significant transformational influence of the second home phenomenon, the local housing fund has experienced the development of a typical second home landscape whose physiognomic characteristics are primarily defined by the presence of building units for vacation and recreation. The main aim of this study is to establish and analyse physiognomic implications of the second home phenomenon in Malinska on the island of Krk. Malinska has been chosen as a typical example of a receiving settlement in the Croatian littoral because it has gone through all characteristic phases of the development of the second home phenomenon – from the prevalence of luxurious villas and resorts through the domination of individual family houses for vacation and recreation (second homes in the strict sense) to numerous multi-apartment buildings which today characterise, more than any other kind of buildings, secondary dwelling. Through the popularisation and growth of secondary dwelling in the period of the Socialist Yugoslavia, and particularly in the "apartmentalisation" phase in the last fifteen years, Malinska has become a true "second home centre" of the island which manifests, more vividly than any other settlement on the island of Krk, direct (physiognomic) and indirect (economic and socio-cultural) impact of secondary recreational dwelling on physical space, and provides an illustrative example of a second home landscape in the Croatian littoral. The methodology is a combination of the analysis of relevant literature about the geographical aspect of the second home phenomenon and field research with direct survey of local population and second home owners in Malinska, mapping, photographing and deduction based on many years of direct acquaintance with the area included in the study.