Trenčín: Day 2 Highlights

On the second day of our consortium meeting, we spent the whole day at the Trenčín Synagogue Cultural Centre — a striking 1913 building that blends Byzantine and Art Nouveau styles, recently restored to its original colourful interior after decades as a more muted exhibition space.

The morning opened with a brilliant presentation from Hana Laššová, an architect involved in Trenčín 2026. She walked us through the city’s story (one of Slovakia’s oldest, sitting on the banks of the Váh and watched over by its dramatic hilltop castle) and how the ECoC programme, built around the theme of “Curiosity,” is reimagining public spaces and reactivating untapped corners of the city — launching the year with more than 100 cultural events across Trenčín’s streets, galleries, castle and neighbourhoods.

From there, our creative partners shared what they’re working on for their interventions, and the rest of the day became genuinely co-creative. We got hands-on with each other’s projects — macramé, sketching and writing on canvas to enable rethinking the tent as a community space and as a tool for sustainable urban development, and using digital tools to imagine a utopian library. We also got to play with one of the interactive light installations from the 2026 ECoC programme, which was a real highlight.

We rounded the day off with a wonderful dinner up at Trenčín Castle. Huge thanks to the staff there for hosting us so warmly, we had a wonderful evening in spite of the surprise showers!

While in Trenčín, we spoke with several people across the day to document their experience of the city and what their work for the project is shaping into over the coming months in their respective cities, so keep an eye on our LinkedIn and Instagram next week for some first-hand accounts.

To learn more about Trenčín’s ECoC agenda, take a look at their official website
here