Words by Francesca Perry
Babyn Yar, a wooded area in the west of Ukraine’s capital Kyiv, is the site of one of the worst massacres of the Nazi regime, which took place in 1941. As part of a long-term process to build The Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center (BYHMC) on the site, a ‘symbolic synagogue’ has been designed by Manuel Herz Architects to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Babyn Yar tragedy.
The Babyn Yar Symbolic Synagogue takes its design inspiration from pop-up books and from the historic wooden synagogues of Ukraine. When closed, the building is a flat structure that is manually opened, and then unfolds into a synagogue space.