Oast houses in the Lower Savinja Valley

Abstract

In the mid-nineteenth century, people in the Lower Savinja Valley began to deliberately introduce a new agricultural and industrial activity – hop-growing, which radically changed the landscape of the valley, as it affected the settlement, architectural as well as demographic structure in the Lower Savinja Valley. Hop-growing gradually took root in the agrarian industry of the Savinja Valley and changed it in such a singular way that it has created a unique Lower Savinja hop-growing cultural landscape. The introduction of hop production increased the need to introduce agricultural buildings typical of this agricultural activity – oast houses – which small and medium-sized farmers, in particular, built as extensions to the existing main agricultural buildings (marofi) or hayracks. Major oast houses with spacious storage halls were only built by big farmers and land owners before the Second World War, and the period from the mid-twentieth century onwards was marked by the construction of big cooperative and hop-growers’ homes, which were designated not only for hop drying and storage but also a series of other activities in the fields of culture, education, banking, cooperativism, and leisure.