Sanatorium Sakartvelo

Location: Tskaltubo, Georgia

Constructed: 1974-1983

Architects: M. Chkhenkeli and R. Janashia

Genre: Brutalist, Soviet architecture, former USSR

Sanatorium Sakartvelo is one of several properties in Tskhaltubo that are part-abandoned and part-occupied by Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), who arrived here as a result of the ethnic-related Georgia-Abkhazia conflict which took place between August 1992 and September 1993. In the region of 8,000 to 9,000 IDPs were given refuge in Tskaltubo where there was a surplus of empty hotel rooms due to the collapse of the town’s spa industry which, in turn, was a consequence of the fall of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. The arrangement was supposed to be temporary but nearly three decades on, the makeshift apartments inside the former sanatoriums have become permanent homes for new generations of families. More information about Sanatorium Sakartvelo.