Joze Plecnik is the architect who gave Ljubljana its face. Born in the city in 1872, he trained in Vienna and worked in Prague, where he remodelled the castle for the new Czechoslovak republic, and in 1921 he returned to his home town as a professor. Over the next three decades he reshaped the capital with bridges, markets, squares, colonnades and a library, and he did it with a classical sensibility that mixed Greek and Roman forms with local materials and an unmistakable wit. His works in Ljubljana are on the UNESCO list.
The Triple Bridge is probably his best-known creation. A simple stone bridge crossed the Ljubljanica at the centre of the old town, and Plecnik added two pedestrian bridges alongside it in the 1930s, so that the central span fans out into a wide, balustraded promenade that opens onto the Preseren Square. The riverside market, with its long colonnade of columns, stands nearby, and the National and University Library, with its brick facade, stone and horse-head door handles, is a short walk away. Inside, a dark staircase leads to a bright reading room, a deliberate journey from darkness to light.
Plecnik also designed the Zale cemetery, a group of chapels and courtyards at the edge of the city, and he laid out riverbanks and promenades that make the city a pleasure to stroll. His style is very personal and not easy to classify, and this is part of its appeal.
Riding in Ljubljana is manageable. The old town is largely closed to cars, with a pedestrian zone, so park at the edge and walk. Traffic is moderate, tram lines do not exist, and cyclists are numerous. Fuel is available at stations on the ring road, and the motorway network leads quickly out of the city. Within an hour you can be in the Julian Alps, where the road over the Vrsic pass climbs through fifty hairpins, or on the Karst plateau toward the Adriatic.
Cafes line the Ljubljanica, and the food is a pleasant mix of Central European and Mediterranean, with sausages, štruklji dumplings and good local wine. Spring is lovely, with the river banks in bloom, and autumn is golden.