Topology of Trauma. Lessons and Experiences of War Memorialization in the Communities of Irpin and Bucha

This article is an attempt to look at the memorialization of war as a spatial and ethical process. In the third article special project "After the crisis: how key satellites of Kyiv are changing" We are talking about the "topology of trauma" - a network of local places of memory that shape the urban experience after a disaster, influencing planning, architecture, investment decisions and the daily lives of residents. As well as about different formats of memorialization - from "traditional" alleys, walls, plaques to a digital book of memory and a VR museum.

The focus is on the experience of the Irpin agglomeration during three and a half years of full-scale war. Among our interlocutors are architects, representatives of the city government, departments of culture and tourism, as well as investors involved in the reconstruction processes. Their positions do not always coincide, but together they outline the field of tension in which a new culture of memory is being formed today - between the need not to forget and the city's right to live on.

A space that remembers: fixing trauma

The Heroes' Memorial Alley, the Romanivskyi Bridge, the "Karavan Gala" and "Giraffe" checkpoints in Irpin, Vokzalna Street and the Wall of Remembrance in Bucha, the "Angels of Victory" memorial in Moshchun, and others — all these places today coexist with active reconstruction processes. Cities are repairing roads, launching new housing and public projects, returning to everyday life scenarios — and at the same time are forced to decide how to preserve the scars of war.

Irpin works with memory on two levels — spatial and personal. The first is recorded in the form of an official register of places of memory, which the community collects and systematizes through the digital platform "Map of War. Archive of War Events". It lists all the locations that played a key role during the defense and occupation: from the Romaniv Bridge and checkpoints to places of mass graves. Each of these points went through a public approval process: preliminary lists, consultations with the military, open hearings, which were attended by residents. It was based on the results of public discussions that new points proposed by the community itself were added to the list. Currently, there are more than two dozen locations on the map; some of them have already been physically marked, while others are just being prepared for memorial design.

The second dimension of memory is emotional and individual. It is recorded in the digital Book of Memory, dedicated to the community's residents who died in the war since 2014. Unlike spatial markers tied to specific coordinates, the Book works with biographies: it tells about people's lives, their dreams, families, professions, and hobbies. The platform is constantly being updated: relatives can add photos, videos, and memories, and the city team is gradually finding the stories of those who have so far remained unknown or unnoticed.

Yevheniya Antonyuk, head of the culture department of the Irpin City Council, which currently deals not only with events and cultural programs, but also with memory issues, coordinates several key projects at once, including the "War Map", which systematizes the official list of places associated with combat operations and losses, as well as the digital Book of Memory.

We are talking to Evgenia Antoniuk about why for Irpin, the fixation of memory begins not with the creation of memorials, but with the documentation and organization of data. But sometimes the physical space itself dictates actions and narratives.

PRAGMATIKA.MEDIA: The first location that cannot be ignored is the Romaniv Bridge. It became a symbol of resistance and salvation and for many Ukrainians remained one of the most painful images of the first months of the invasion. How do you see the future of this place and what has already been done?

Yevhenia Antonyuk: Currently, traffic across the Irpin River has been restored, and a temporary memorial has been set up on the destroyed bridge until a decision is made to create a full-fledged memorial complex. The Romaniv Bridge is important not only for the Irpin community, but also for the entire region and Ukraine as a whole. Most official delegations visiting Kyiv also come to Irpin, and the shortest route for them to get acquainted with the events of the war passes through the Romaniv Bridge. Therefore, regardless of the further decision - whether it will be about conservation or architectural intervention - we understand that this should be a civilized public space. This also includes basic infrastructure: convenient entrances, parking lots, sanitary areas, possible catering points, elements of tourist navigation and souvenir solutions.

We expect the number of visitors to grow, so we are talking about responsible, civilized tourism - one that at the same time supports the community and the tourism industry as a whole. That is why we see the need for a high-quality architectural competition and the creation of a memorial space designed for the long term - for 50-100 years. It should be a place that can work with dignity with the traumatic experience that the Romaniv Bridge represents, while at the same time meeting the expectations of society.

PM: There are also lesser-known, but no less important locations, such as the Caravan Gala checkpoint. What is this place to you and how did it begin to take shape as a memorial space?

E. A.: "Caravan Gala" is an area near the Warsaw highway, where during the fighting there was one of the heroic checkpoints of the Irpin community. Fighting took place there, several of our residents who defended Irpin died there. In 2025, a decision was made to erect a memorial sign — an installation marking this place of resistance.

During the preparatory work, we accidentally found an underground reservoir that was built back in Soviet times to service a large enterprise. It was spacious enough, and we decided to reimagine it as a museum space. Part of the room was fortified and equipped with a civilized entrance. Inside, we collected photographs of Irpin in the spring of 2022 - a city in ruins. This is how a small underground museum appeared, telling about the first weeks of defense. There are photos, stands, and a powerful video series: we broadcast footage from social networks and personal archives of the defenders. A separate wall is dedicated to the defenders of this checkpoint. On it are fragments of ammunition, fragments of wooden boxes, elements of ammunition - everything that remained in the space after the battles.

The location has become important not only for the townspeople. Foreign delegations, Ukrainian officials and journalists come to it. Seeing the interest, we started thinking about further development. Currently, only a third of the available space is used, so the reserve is significant. We see the potential for creating a full-fledged museum space, also focused on contemporary art and creative reflections on the war.

The premises have already been transferred to the balance of the culture department. The preparation of documentation is underway, and next year we plan to move on to design. In the future, a museum working at the intersection of military history, art, and public memory.

PM: The question of interaction inevitably arises: what happens when memory locations intersect with new construction or engineering work? What should be the mechanism for coordinating such situations?

E. A.: We are really working in a situation where the legislation has not yet caught up with reality. War memorial sites have not yet been designated as a separate category of protected objects, but it is logical to focus on the same procedure that regulates work with cultural heritage. This implies an individual approach to each location, because they are all very different in importance and scale.

When it comes to engineering works or projects that are critical to the community, such as laying communications or building a new highway, making a decision requires an analysis of alternatives. Where possible, intervention should be avoided; if it is impossible to bypass the memorial site, compensatory mechanisms should be provided. For symbolic markers - memorial signs or plaques - such a solution may be to relocate it after public discussion. But when it comes to a full-fledged memorial, in the creation of which funds and meanings have been invested, its relocation is practically impossible. This is important to consider even at the planning stage.

Yevheniya Antonyuk: "We are working in a situation where legislation has not yet caught up with reality. War memorial sites have not yet been designated as a separate category of protected objects, but it is logical to focus on the same procedure that regulates work with cultural heritage."

Currently, legislation regarding such locations is only being formed, but it is quite likely that in the future we will have legal norms similar to protected zones of monuments, with defined boundaries and restrictions on intervention. This is a natural development of the situation, as the need for a systemic approach already exists not only in Irpin, but in all communities that have experienced hostilities.

So far, we have not had any conflicts, partly because most of the locations are in the early stages of design, and partly because the city team is trying to anticipate possible intersections. For example, along the roads where the checkpoints are located, infrastructure modernization is quite possible, but after the work is completed, the memorial site must be marked again. It is important for us that it remains visible and inscribed in the space under any circumstances.

PM: Have business representatives and developers become community partners in this process? How active is their participation?

E. A.: In our case, we can speak of a responsible position of both developers and investors. They are very well aware of the meaning of these initiatives, because their facilities — both those residential complexes that are already inhabited and those that were unfinished at the time of the invasion — survived all the events of the war along with the city.

Many of them needed restoration, and our developers usually do not limit themselves to construction alone. They support the operation of housing even after it is put into use, and they understand why some needs cannot be covered solely by budget funds. Therefore, supporting memory-related projects is a logical continuation of their cooperation with the city.

There are specific examples of such participation. The MOLODIST investment group and Society of the "BRAVE" financed the installation of two memorial objects: the monument "On the Shield" on the territory of the temple and a monument in the city center dedicated to the residents of Irpin who participated in its liberation. With their support, the territory of the "Caravan Gala" checkpoint was improved and the first stage of the underground exhibition gallery was created.

This shows that investors have already become our partners in this work, not formally, but at the level of specific actions and implemented projects. And it seems that even more opportunities for such cooperation lie ahead.

Remember and build: the postwar ethics of development

The memory map, which has not yet been fully formed, is already influencing the development of the city. And the further the reconstruction progresses, the more often these interests will intersect. This raises the question: who, besides the community and the authorities, takes responsibility for ensuring that memory does not disappear under the concrete slabs of new projects? In Irpin, an important part of the answers is on the side of developers. We talk to Volodymyr Karplyuk about the balance between investment and memory, about red lines for developers and about the role of business in understanding the war, CEO of the MOLODIST Investment Group and the "BRAVING" Society, chairman of the Irpin Investment Council.

PRAGMATIKA.MEDIA: From the perspective of a developer working with a space that has memory, how do you see the role of business in the emergence of the first memorial practices? What initiatives were implemented with your participation and what is behind them for you?

Volodymyr Karplyuk:

For us, this work began long before the full-scale invasion. Since 2015, we have strived to make the memory of the heroes of modern war a part of the city's everyday life — not just official ceremonies, but also the daily experience and upbringing of young people. It was our enterprises that came up with the initiative to create the Alley of Heroes of the ATO.

We supported the project of sculptor Boris Krylov, who proposed the composition "Resistance", which embodied the struggle of the townspeople against the Russian invader. We also participated in the installation of a memorial sign for the Day of Territorial Defense - this initiative was important both for the city and for the people who stood up for its defense in the first days of the war.

Next to the Caravan Gala checkpoint, an exhibition hub was implemented with our initiative and support — a space that allows us to understand the war and its consequences for the city through artifacts and documentary evidence. This project was made possible precisely thanks to the partnership between business and the community.

I would like to separately mention the new memorial object "On the Shield", proposed by Boris Krylov and Oles Sydoruk. In the center of the composition is a boy holding an award from his deceased father. The work has a very strong emotional nature, and I am glad that we, together with other entrepreneurs of the city, had the opportunity to join the implementation of this project. For us, this is a form of responsibility to the city in which we live and work.

PM: Can we talk about conditional "red lines" on the city map - areas where the presence of memory takes priority over development? How do you determine which spaces remain untouched and where development is possible provided that memory is integrated?

VC.: Such territories exist, and they are not a vague moral concept - they are officially defined. The Kyiv Regional Military Administration, together with relevant institutions, recorded the first locations that have a special symbolic value for the city. In Irpen, this is primarily the Romanivskyi Bridge, which became a vital evacuation route and literally saved hundreds of people. These are the checkpoints "Giraf" and "Caravan Gala", where our defenders held back the enemy and won precious time for the city. This is also a destroyed house of culture, which personifies both loss and future reconstruction.

These points cannot be considered as vacant plots in the traditional development sense. After extensive public discussions, they should receive the status and function of places of memory. We understand that in some cases the city will develop around these locations, but not instead of them. Memory should be integrated, not displaced.

PM: Some investors prefer to work with "clean" land without a complex history, controversial interpretations, or tragic markers. Where do you think the ethical line is drawn between developing a territory and repressing memory?

VC.: In my opinion, the thesis of "avoidance of memory" no longer reflects reality today. Irpin has almost completely regained its investment attractiveness, and this happened not due to the silence about the tragedy, but on the contrary, due to its honest recognition. Both Ukrainian society and international partners understand: the memory of this war is not a burden, but a marker of values.

We see that global institutions, funds, private investors want to be involved in the recovery. For them, a “clean product” is not a sterile space without history, but a fair, open and honest context. The world stands on the side of Irpin precisely because the struggle for freedom took place here. And this is the strongest basis for long-term development.

The ethical line, as I see it, is drawn where development tries to displace memory. But when urban development works with memory, creating spaces where both people and stories live, it is not a contradiction, but an evolution of the city.

Volodymyr Karplyuk: "The thesis about "avoidance of memory" no longer reflects reality today. Irpin has almost completely regained its investment attractiveness, and this happened not due to the silence about the tragedy, but on the contrary, due to its honest recognition"

PM: Can large development businesses play an active role in shaping a culture of remembrance through the integration of war themes into urban spaces, routes, names, and other formats? Or is memorialization solely the responsibility of communities and state institutions?

VC.: In my opinion, the participation of business here is determined not so much by professional profile, but by personal and civic position. Developers naturally have more points of contact with urban planning decisions, but the mere ability to influence does not mean that they should shape the content of memorial practices.

The initiative regarding concepts, contents, and artistic solutions must come from the professional cultural community: historians, curators, architects, urban anthropologists. Their work requires knowledge of the context, responsibility for the interpretation of traumatic experiences, and a long-term horizon.

The role of developers here is rather supportive: to create resources, provide land or infrastructure opportunities, and cooperate with the city in the development of territories. But what narratives will emerge in the urban space is the competence of cultural institutions and the community.

PM: If we imagine Irpin in 10–15 years, what might be the relationship between a city that is actively being built and a city that preserves memory? Should architecture be the material carrier of this experience, or should it be consolidated by other tools — education, culture, community practices?

VC.: The memory of this war is not an episode or a temporary emotion. It is of fundamental importance for the future of Ukraine. We must realize: attempts at revenge will continue even after the victory in the field of narratives, culture, and identity. Russia will invest resources in the return of the false idea of ​​"fraternal peoples", and that is why it is unacceptable for memory to be dissolved in everyday life.

Architecture certainly plays a role: it records history in material, forms places of pause and reflection, sets a framework for shared experience. But space is only one of the carriers of memory. Education, culture, documentation, local community initiatives are what ensure the continuity of the transmission of content between generations.

If Irpin will become a city of the future, it will be precisely because it will be able to work with the past, not rejecting it and not turning it into a museum, but weaving it into its identity. A city of freedom, a city of open opportunities, but with a clear understanding of the price at which this freedom was acquired.

Memory that has a specific weight

If developers form a request for memorial projects, and cultural operators set the content, then the city itself determines the rules of the game: what, where and how can be built, which locations are inviolable, and how quickly the city's memory strategy should be updated. Where are the boundaries between the civic responsibility of the private sector and the obligations of the city? What "red lines" should municipal authorities establish?
We asked Andriy Kravchuk, First Deputy Mayor of Irpin in 2020–2025, currently an advisor to the mayor, about city rules, norms, and possible compromises.

PRAGMATIKA.MEDIA: Irpin today works with two powerful vectors: reconstruction and fixation of war experience. To what extent are these logics consistent in city policy? Does memory have a formal status in planning decisions?

Andriy Kravchuk: Irpin understood one key thing: development is identical only when it is based on memory. The war has become the starting point that determines all our management decisions. Yes, we build and attract investments, but the logic of "maximizing square meters" is not dominant for us. We cannot allow new residential complexes, roads, or commercial facilities to erase history. A city cannot be built up to the point of losing meaning. Therefore, memory for us is not an abstract concept, but a real factor in spatial planning.

That is why in 2024 the city officially identified key military locations - from the Romanivskyi Bridge and the Karavan Gala and Giraffe checkpoints to the Central House of Culture and the military section of the cemetery. All of these spaces are now well-groomed, have information stands, and remain living points of urban memory. In urban planning policy, memory has a specific weight: memorial zones are outlined, restrictions on development are imposed, and interference with authentic objects is prohibited. The example of the Romanivskyi Bridge is very indicative: we did not rebuild it in the same place, leaving space for the future memorial, and at the same time built a new bridge nearby - as a symbol of restoration, but without "erasing the past."

In parallel, we are building a system of spatial and symbolic forms of memory. This is the Heroes' Memorial Alley on the central square of Irpin, as well as alleys in the villages of the community - Mykhailivtsi-Rubezhivtsi and Kozyntsi. We are clearly aware that the format of such alleys in the form of banners in central public spaces is a forced and temporary solution. The areas on which they are placed are limited, and the war is ongoing. Therefore, it is necessary to rethink their format.

The Book of Memory of the Irpin City Territorial Community is the only electronic register that immortalizes the fallen defenders and killed civilians, starting in 2014. It is important that the electronic terminal of the Book of Memory is located in the central square of Irpin, the book is also available in electronic form.

This year, the city management team also began the reconstruction of the Alley of Memory of the Defenders of Ukraine at the city's Central Cemetery. This is a large-scale and very important project. New monuments will be installed on the graves of the Heroes - Cossack crosses or slabs, a ceremonial area, access roads and landscaping will be arranged.

This is not a compromise between memory and development. It is a conscious strategy: the city grows not in defiance of memory, but thanks to it as a moral and planning reference point.

PM: When a major developer comes to Irpin, is taking into account the war context and memorial locations a mandatory requirement? Or is it more a matter of the developer's corporate culture?

A.K.: In Irpin, the memory of the war is the foundation of urban development. Every developer who starts working in the community quickly realizes that it is impossible to ignore the context, and this becomes obvious both through the position of the city authorities and through an active community. We clearly know where it is possible to build, where it is inappropriate, and where it is simply unacceptable.

However, no MUO or DPT (MUO - Urban Planning Conditions and Restrictions, DPT - Detailed Plan of the Territory. - Ed. Note) will not replace what I call the developer's culture. The document may limit in meters, but it will not form the moral meaning of decisions. A responsible developer perceives the territory not as a land resource, but as part of a living history, where every decision affects the identity of the city.

Irpin has a unique experience in this sense. A significant part of local business voluntarily participates in the creation of memorial infrastructure not for PR, but because they survived the war together with the city. The “BRAVING” Society, the “MOLODIST” investment group, and the “Synergy” construction group systematically support memorial initiatives: from sculptures and improvement of checkpoints to the creation of a full-fledged memorial “On the Shield”, opened in 2025 with the participation of business and the community.

The activities of these companies are not limited to material gestures. "BRAVE" also invest in cultural memory, for example, in the publication of the anthology "Poetry of War. The Word of the Hero City of Irpin", which captures the experience of residents through texts and images.

For us, such cases are a marker of maturity. We do not demand a single template, but we expect a responsible attitude towards a city that has survived the occupation. And practice proves: the best projects for the community are born where formal norms are combined with an internal understanding of the meaning of the place.

PM: What exactly do you think should remain in the urban space as a reminder of the war? And who has the right to make such decisions: the authorities and the community or the investor or the architect?

A.K.: I am convinced: Irpin has no right to become a city without traces of war. It is not about cultivating pain, but about responsibility to the dead and to those who will live here after us. But memory is not about preserving ruins as museum exhibits. We are not a city-catastrophe. We are a city that lives, recovers, and builds the future.

Today we have a formed list of places of collective memory, agreed upon with the community. These are our main points on which we rely in spatial decisions. But defining them is only half the battle. It is important that they are meaningful and properly integrated into the city - in the form of memorials, artistic and architectural markers, public spaces. As for the decision-making process, it cannot be monopolized. The architect forms the vision, the government - the balance and framework, the community - the values, the investor - the method of implementation. Real, sustainable solutions are born where these positions do not compete, but interact.

Therefore, it is fundamentally important for us not to preserve the city in trauma, but also not to erase its traces. To translate the experience of destruction into an experience of memory so that new projects do not deny the past, but speak to it in a mode of respect and development.

Open Fracture: When the space does not heal, but reminds

Memory can be embodied not only in stone and bronze. The liberated satellites of Kyiv are testing other formats: light, text, visualization, VR, digital archives. "Map of War", "Book of Memory", the installation "Road of Life" created by Expolight, the concept of a torn city Open Fracture by balbek bureau - all these are examples of how today's memory can be not a monument, but a process. Temporality, mobility, the possibility of adaptation - the advantages of such tools. However, the risks are obvious: memory can be fragile. How to work with the city, trauma and people's expectations in this balance, comments Slava Balbek, architect, founder of balbek bureau.

Back in 2022, balbek bureau, on its own initiative, developed and presented the concept of a memorial space on the site of the destroyed Romanivskyi Bridge. The project, called Open Fracture, proposed not to restore the old structure, but rather to preserve the fracture as material evidence of the events of the defense and evacuation of Irpin. The architects envisaged minimal intervention so as not to “shout” over the history itself: observation platforms and a pedestrian gallery that would allow people to directly see and experience the “scar” of the space, and also laid a restrained material language — steel, concrete, the texture of the ruin.

PRAGMATIKA.MEDIA: When you were working on the Open Fracture concept, Romanivskyi Bridge was an “open wound”. Today it is already a functioning transport hub. In your opinion, does the status of trauma change when a space heals engineeringly but not emotionally? Does architecture have the right to “open” a crack again?

Slava Balbek: For now, the bridge remains a wound, or rather, a scar. The function of movement was taken over by a new bridge built nearby, but the old one did not disappear either physically or symbolically. The very fact that the infrastructure solution did not "erase" the previous object makes memory inevitable. And this is important. Therefore, the memory of the event must remain. Not as an emotional gesture and not as a dramatic image, but as a fact inscribed in space.

PM: Ukrainian cities are experiencing a temptation to "forget," some want silence, normality, a life beyond trauma. Where, in your opinion, is the line between healing and the dangerous repression of memory?

S. B.: I don't have a ready-made universal answer — and, to be honest, I'm not sure that it's even possible. I, like everyone else, perceive these places through the prism of my own experience and emotions. What's closer to me, to my home, is much more difficult to perceive cold-bloodedly and abstractly. But I am firmly convinced of one thing: memorialization should be systemic at the level of the entire country, and not spot-on, where decisions will depend on the taste, budget, or local vision of each city or village. A single framework of values ​​and principles is important not for unifying form, but for forming emotional unity. Without this, we risk getting fragmented memory — a set of separate gestures without a common meaning.

Slava Balbek: "I consider the whole of Ukraine as a space of memorialization. Therefore, for me the key question is not "What should the memorial be like in a specific place?", but "What should the overall memory strategy be?""

PM: And if you had complete carte blanche and an unlimited budget, but a clear condition — minimal form, maximal content, then how do you see the memorialization of places like Romaniv Bridge? Is it an object, a process, or perhaps the absence of an object?

S. B.: I want to emphasize that I consider the whole of Ukraine as a space of memorialization. Therefore, for me, the key question is not “What should a memorial be like in a specific place?” but “What should the overall memory strategy be?” If I had complete carte blanche and an unlimited budget, I would work primarily not with form, but with vision. Not with a single object, but with principles that can scale, adapt, and live in different contexts, from large cities to small communities. According to this logic, individual places, such as Romanivskyi Bridge, become not self-sufficient memorials, but elements of a larger system. And, perhaps, this is precisely where there is a minimum of form and a maximum of content.

The memorial as part of the city center, not an "island of grief"

In the spring of 2025, Bucha announced the results of an architectural competition to create a memorial complex designed to honor those killed during the March 2022 events. Six Ukrainian and international teams participated in the competition, and the Urban Design concept led by Stanislav Demin won.

The "Liberation" complex will be located on the site of the Church of St. Andrew the First-Called and All Saints, next to the place where 116 residents who died during the occupation are buried in a mass grave. According to the architects' plan, the memorial will become not only a place of mourning, but also part of the urban fabric: integrated into the routes of the center of Bucha, accessible to all population groups and connected to public spaces. In parallel, public discussions are underway to determine the final decisions on the content and modes of use of the future space.

Stanislav Dyomin, architect and founder of Urban Design, talks about the logic of the decision, architectural meanings, and the role of memory in a city that continues to live.

PRAGMATIKA.MEDIA: The memorial appears in the center of Bucha, which is simultaneously being rebuilt and living a new life. How does "Liberation" fit into the daily urban scenario: will it be a place of attraction, silence, transit, or a space for public events?

Stanislav Dyomin: The "Liberation" memorial complex is located on a plot of over 3 hectares, which encloses the central axis of Bucha - Energetikiv Street. Nearby are the city hall, public and medical institutions, the main square, and on the opposite side - a park with a monument to Taras Shevchenko. Thus, the memorial becomes part of a large city center, and not a separate symbolic object.

The church of St. Andrew the Apostle and All Saints is located on the territory, which already generates significant flows of citizens and visitors. The space between the street and the church is transformed into a regular park with a pond, recreational areas and playgrounds. The memorial part itself is separated from this everyday environment by relief and landscaping and is located on the other side of the church - closer to the place where the victims of the occupation were buried. The memorial is integrated into the city infrastructure and is accessible to everyone, but is not imposed as a daily transit route.

PM: You talk about integrating memory into the city. Can the memorial be considered part of the infrastructure, rather than a separate island? What urban principles guided its creation: accessibility, barrier-free, light, safety?

S.D.: The entire territory of the city center of Buchi is currently being planned, designed and built as a barrier-free space. Most issues regarding accessibility are resolved through planning, without the use of mechanical lifts. We use terrain slopes, ramps. All of this, of course, is carried out in accordance with current norms and practices, accompanied by the Accessibility Council and an expert group under the Ministry of Development (the Ministry of Community and Territorial Development, the former Ministry of Regional Development. — Ed. note). In addition, which is very important, major repairs and development of the engineering infrastructure of the territory are being carried out: storm sewers are being laid, water supply and sewage networks are being changed and developed, electrical networks and lighting networks are being hidden underground and transferred. The traffic pattern has also been changed, areas with traffic restrictions and pedestrian priority are being formed, safe intersections, raised (dry) pedestrian crossings are being created, lighting and landscaping are being replaced, and a navigation network for the central area of ​​the city is being formed.

Of course, such approaches extend to the territory of the memorial complex, not only to the street space, but also to the internal spaces of the memorial. For example, the main entrances to the underground part of the memorial, where the main exposition is located, are made through ramps with a slope of less than 5%. Functionally and in terms of planning, the memorial becomes a useful and convenient part of the city infrastructure.

PM: Residents live literally next to the sites of mass crimes. How does the project take into account the psychological factor: fatigue from grief, desire for normality, the right to live without daily reminders?

S.D.: This is what we thought about when searching for the image. We did not try to immortalize the tragedy: it is immortalized in the heart of every Ukrainian. We were looking for an aesthetically neutral approach, a place for reflection, for solitude. The area around the memorial is a place where you can sit down and look at the water, at the monumental forms, remember something, think about life, return to the church and thank God that we are alive. The very form of the memorial is about how not to give up: it sinks underground and rises from under it, it is powerful and concrete, like the spirit of Ukrainians, and this is what the memorial reminds us of - about how to be strong, move on and fight, and not sink into grief.

From local experience to a pan-Ukrainian model

Irpin and Bucha are rapidly rebuilding today, but at the same time they are becoming laboratories of a new memory policy. It is on their basis that the first national route of war sites was formed, which for the first time offers systematic, rather than spontaneous, work with trauma locations. The Kyiv region has become a pilot site where criteria are selected, design solutions are tested, and mechanisms for cooperation between the authorities, the Institute of National Remembrance, and communities are developed. Anna Kutsenko, director of the State Enterprise "Ukraine Tourism" (director of the Department of Culture and Tourism of the Kyiv Regional Military Administration in 2022–2024), tells how this experience is being scaled up to other regions and what is happening behind the scenes of these processes.

PRAGMATIKA.MEDIA: Kyiv region today is a region with very different experiences of destruction and restoration. Irpin, Bucha, Gostomel, Borodyanka, Moshchun — all have different levels of trauma. Is there a single strategy for working with places of memory, or does each community have to develop its own scenario?

Anna Kutsenko: Kyiv region became the first region to be liberated from occupation. It was here that systematic commemorations of the dead began in April, and already in 2022, together with the Ministry of Development and the regional military administration, a decision was made: to begin the formation of a national route of memory from Kyiv region. We considered this as a pilot project — a model that can be scaled up to other territories.

The first points of the route were Moshchun, Borodyanka, Bucha and Irpin. At the same time, within the regional administration, we created a coordination group, which included representatives of various units and the families of the deceased. This was a fundamental point: we did not want to make decisions behind the scenes. Memory is a shared space, and the people it directly affects must be heard.

At the same time, we understood from the first months that communities should not turn exclusively into a “landscape of trauma”. It is important for us to talk not only about losses, but also about resistance and hope. Yes, Romanivskyi Bridge is not only a point of destruction, but also a “road of life” and a symbol of salvation. And Moshun is an example of courage that changed the course of events in the Kyiv region.

As for the strategy, we already have a common approach, but it does not dictate a single form for everyone. Together with the Institute of National Remembrance, we are developing criteria: what is considered a place of memory, how to define it and how to work with it in the future. This became a necessity, because immediately after the liberation, many communities sought to turn almost every damaged building into a museum. This is a completely understandable emotional reaction, but from the point of view of long-term work, it is not always effective.

Therefore, the first steps were very pragmatic: we began to systematically collect photos, videos, and testimonies, effectively forming a single archive. And then we looked for answers to the questions: what happened at each specific location, what role it played during the events, and how it coexists with reconstruction.

And here another important nuance arises: the residents themselves often strive to remove the traces of the war and return to normal, while those who left or are arriving for the first time want to understand what exactly happened here. The Kyiv region continues to receive people from Ukraine and abroad, and for them it is important to preserve this memory, to show the context and meaning of what was experienced.

PM: And how do you find a balance between the desire to live on and the need to prevent memory from being displaced by layers of normality?

A.K.: First of all, we are not working with individual points, but with the space as a whole. All locations included in the pilot route are parts of a single system: places of destruction, evacuation stops, rescue points, routes along which people moved. That is why it is important not only to mark them, but to fit them into the logic of the city and the region.

When creating the "Road of Life", we deliberately did not limit ourselves to a monument or a place of commemoration. The route has an educational function: information steles, QR codes, AR and VR elements allow you to learn the stories of eyewitnesses, see the context of events and understand how the city itself survived the invasion. A person can independently walk the path within Irpin or continue it to other settlements of Kyiv, Chernihiv and Sumy regions.

After the pilot, it became clear that communities needed support and ready-made tools. That’s why we developed a unified identity for the project so that any location would be immediately recognizable as part of a larger story. But the forms remain different: we don’t unify the content, but provide a single visual language.

In parallel, a set of templates for communities has been developed: design solutions, ready-made formats for information materials, scripts for AR and short videos. The community determines the place of memory and coordinates the story with a specially created working group of the Ministry of Development, and then integrates it into the space, without starting from scratch.

This is how we try to preserve memory without "preserving" life. The goal is for people to be able to live, recover, and at the same time remain in the field of understanding what happened.

PM: In your opinion, who exactly should define places of remembrance, set building restrictions, and delineate protected areas?

A.K.: Above all, it is important to go beyond the notion of memory as individual monuments or memorials. It is about the politics of spatial development in general: how war is inscribed in master plans, spatial planning, public spaces, and infrastructure.

Today, work with such territories is coordinated by the Ministry of Community and Territorial Development, but decisions are not made in the narrow logic of "putting up a memorial sign." The key question is how places of memory coexist with the reconstruction and return of people to communities. At the same time, we face regulatory challenges. Some locations are already being applied for the status of cultural heritage sites, and this requires cooperation with the Ministry of Culture, the definition of protection zones and rules for the existence of new development nearby. One of the illustrative cases is Romanivskyi Bridge, where the project falls under the purview of the Ministry of Community and Territorial Development, but the land around certain points is privately owned.

In the future, we see the need to create a museum of memory, and this requires the joint participation of several levels of government, as well as communities. At the same time, business remains an important partner. In Irpin, we worked with the "BRAVING" Society, which took on part of the responsibility not as a donor of one-time projects, but as a participant in a long-term urban ecosystem. Such examples show: memory cannot exist only on the budget, it relies on cooperation.

We aim to scale this logic. Memory trails are launched not to preserve trauma, but to give people a tool for return through a format that revitalizes cities: visitors, coffee shops, local services, the economy.

Today, the memory routes operate at least on weekends: free guided tours are organized from Kyiv to Moshchun, Irpin, Bucha, and Borodyanka. This is a conscious decision so that people not only see the places of memory, but also start using local services, leaving their money on the ground.

Anna Kutsenko: "We work not with one industry, but with a hybrid space that simultaneously lies in the plane of culture, tourism, urban planning, landscaping, infrastructure and heritage protection"

The same practice is used in Chernihiv and Sumy regions, and now in Kherson, Kharkiv, Odessa and other regions. Each region selects five pilot locations that are part of a single national system.

And most importantly: no decision is made without the community. The work is based on a constant dialogue with local residents and families of the deceased. That is why Irpin, Bucha and Moshchun became the first, but certainly not the last, in this system.

PM: The regulatory framework needs changes. However, are there any other areas outside of urban planning and land plans that need improvement?

A.K.: In fact, we are not working with one industry, but with a hybrid space that simultaneously lies in the plane of culture, tourism, urban planning, landscaping, infrastructure and heritage protection. That is why today the Ministry of Development is developing a new resolution: it should determine the customers and executors of such projects, as well as create a clear mechanism for interaction between the state, communities and other partners. In essence, we are forming a single corridor for decision-making: how is a place of memory determined, who agrees on its status and who is responsible for implementation.

A separate challenge is the issue of maintenance. An object cannot simply be created: it must be looked after, provided with security, updated with information support, and communicated with families. This even includes content production. For example, a short video about a deceased person is not a single shoot, but a long work with relatives, psychologically complex and often multi-level. And the final word always belongs to the family, and that is right.

We want to translate these tasks into a national scale, but not through mechanical copying of forms. We consciously move away from “soldiers all over the country” and work with principles and tools. Therefore, we involve various experts, architects, artists, who allow us to create worthy solutions without excessive budgets and without the final “stitching up” of the form for decades. Hence our choice of temporary and adaptive solutions. We mark places, include them in routes, create access infrastructure, but we are not in a hurry with monuments. The next stage is architectural competitions and projects that will organically grow from the work already done.

This strategy is designed for many years. And that is why back in 2022 we laid the key foundation — total digitalization. Today, a complete digital archive of places of memory is being formed, which contains records, photos, videos, testimonies and will be integrated into a single portal. It is important that not only communities, but also residents themselves will be able to add information to it: eyewitnesses, families, people who know the history of a specific location. After verification, this data forms a much broader, living image of memory, not a museum catalog, but a folk history, where every testimony is important.

Unfinished Landscape: Between Today and an Unknown Tomorrow

The network of memorial sites across Ukraine is growing faster than the rules for its existence have had time to form. Every day, new locations appear where life is torn apart for decades to come. Many open questions remain. How to record the points of individual deaths in public space? How to work with places where people independently erect crosses or leave spontaneous memorials — from photographs to artifacts found in burned areas? Do they become part of official history, or do they disappear along with the trauma of those who erected them?

Ukraine is still at war. Not all communities are ready for digital tools; not all families seek publicity; not all communities have the resources to preserve memory in tangible form. That is why a national strategy should not be about the same images, but about the same principles of action: delicacy, complicity, a long-term perspective.

This text does not provide a final answer to the question of what the memory map of Ukraine will look like. But the experience of Irpin, Bucha, and neighboring communities outlines a direction: memory should not replace life, but should accompany it. It can be temporary or digital, private or public, local or national, but its meaning is unchanged - not to allow the experience of destruction to turn into silence.