My Prague

Young director Šimon Holý this week sees his film And Then There Was Love enter Czech cinemas. It is the second feature film by Holý, who in addition composes music for films and until recently was also a presenter on alternative station Radio Wave. Our tour of “his Prague” begins on the square Náměstí Míru, one of the centres of the Vinohrady district.

Jakub Kaifosz is one of the Czech Republic's most notable and original independent musicians and performs under the name Lazer Viking. His latest album, Tunnel Vision, is due out in September. Kaifosz has a very close attachment to Prague's Letná district, where our tour of “his Prague” begins in the spacious bar of the Bio Oko arthouse cinema.

Helena Koutná is one of the Czech Republic's leading interpreters. Many people know her from the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, where for decades she has been appearing onstage alongside some of the planet's biggest movie stars. Koutná lives in the city's seventh district and our tour of “her Prague” begins at the café and brewery Lajka, on the street U Akademie.  

Slovenian filmmaker Olmo Omerzu has been living in Prague for a decade and a half. In that time the director has enjoyed lots of success with Czech-made movies such as Winter Flies and his most recent work, Bird Atlas. Our tour of “his Prague” begins at the spacious café Kolektor at the Trade Fair Palace (Veletržní palace) in Prague 7, which was previously known as Café Jedna.

Thanks to his Honest Guide videos, Janek Rubeš is THE face of Prague for many people around the world. The Honest Guide shows warn visitors about all kinds of scams in the Czech capital – but also reflect their presenter’s clear love of the city. Our tour of “Janek Rubeš’s Prague” begins on a bench by the park in the picturesque Kampa district.

Luke Allnutt is a senior journalist at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. The Englishman’s career will enter a new and exciting phase in early 2018 with the publication of his gripping debut novel We Own the Sky, which has been sold in 30-odd countries around the world. Our tour of “Luke Allnutt’s Prague” begins by the Vltava River, on the embankment known as Naplávka.

Bianca Bellová this year won the top Czech literary award Litera Magnesia for her novel Jezero (The Lake), an honour that was soon followed by a European Union Prize for Literature. The first stop on our tour of “Bianca Bellová’s Prague” is the suburb of Radlice. The writer lived in the district until the age of 10, when the original Radlice village was razed to make way for Metro construction.

Former Prague mayor Jan Kasl takes us to his Bubeneč ‘hood and Malá Strana, where he lived at an exciting time.

Since becoming director of the Czech National Gallery three years ago this month, Jiří Fajt has secured exhibitions by major international artists and helped make its numerous buildings in the capital more accessible to the public. Our tour of “his Prague” begins at the Convent of St. Agnes of Bohemia on the edge of the Old Town. It houses the National Gallery’s impressive medieval collection and was headed by the Prague-born Fajt himself in the late 1990s.

David Dorůžka is one of the Czech Republic’s best jazz musicians. The guitarist studied at the Berklee College of Music in Boston and later spent time in New York and Paris. A few months ago he released his latest album, Autumn Tales. Our tour of “David Dorůžka’s Prague” begins at the Branické skály, a rocky outcrop overlooking the Vltava close to where the 37-year-old was raised in a musical household: his grandfather was the jazz expert and writer Lubomír Dorůžka, while his father Petr is a well-known music journalist.

Tomáš Baldýnský is a well-known TV writer and producer whose most recent work was the hit comedy Kosmo. Over the years he has also been a newspaper columnist and film critic, among various other activities. Our tour of “Tomáš Baldýnský’s Prague” begins in the city’s Letná district at Club 777, a dingy open-all hours bar with slot machines in the back.Audio Player

Zdeněk Lukeš is one of the country’s best known architects. During the 1990s he was part of Václav Havel’s team revitalising Prague Castle and he still works in its monuments department, while as an author and journalist he has done a great deal to popularise architecture in the Czech Republic. Our tour of “Zdeněk Lukeš’s Prague” is in fact a tour of his Letná, the leafy area he has always called home. We begin with a coffee at the district’s Café Alchymista, specifically in the lovely garden in the back.

For listeners around the world, Rob Cameron has, as the BBC’s correspondent in the city, been the voice of Prague for many years. The London-born journalist, who moved here in 1993, is a former colleague of ours at Radio Prague. He is also my own oldest friend in the Czech Republic. Our tour of “Rob Cameron’s Prague” starts in the city’s Nusle district, just across the street from the Na Fidlovačce theatre by the Botič river.

After over a quarter of a century in the city, curator Richard Drury is a well-known face in Prague’s art world. The Englishman – who studied Czech at Cambridge – works at the Gallery of Central Bohemia and is also the head of the Fine Arts Section of Umělecká beseda, a cultural association with a history stretching back to the days of the Czech National Revival. Our tour of “Richard Drury’s Prague” begins by Bílá Hora in Prague 6 at the Hvězda game reserve, which gets its name from the star-shaped summer palace at its heart.

Ondřej Hrab is the founder and director of Archa Theatre, Prague’s leading contemporary arts venue. Since Hrab took the space over in 1991, Archa (Ark in English) has played host to many of the world’s top names in cutting-edge theatre and dance, as well as musicians of the calibre of Patti Smith, Randy Newman and Philip Glass. And given his deep, quarter-century association with the venue, it’s a natural starting point for our tour of “Ondřej Hrab’s Prague”.

Journalist Jana Ciglerová has held several positions at the top Czech dailies Mladá fronta DNES and Lidové noviny, and now writes for the former’s weekly supplement Magazín DNES. Our tour of “her Prague” soon turns into a very enjoyable trip down memory lane, starting at Velryba (The Whale) on Opatovická St. The café has been one of the best spots of its kind in the city for nearly two and a half decades.

As one half of the award-winning duo Republic of Two and with his solo project Piano, Mikoláš Růžička is a well-known figure on the Prague music scene. A native of Bechyně in South Bohemia, the musician also has a day job teaching at the city’s Academy of Fine Arts. Our tour of “Mikoláš Růžička’s Prague” begins on Jiřího z Poděbrad square in front of Jože Plečnik’s modernist Church of the Most Sacred Heart of Our Lord.

Steve Gove is the founder and director of the Prague Fringe festival, which has just got underway in the Czech capital for the 15th time. The Scot has been living in the city since 1997 and is an infectiously enthusiastic guide to “his Prague”. Our tour begins at Malostranská Beseda, an historic venue on the main square in the Lesser Quarter that has been the hub of Prague Fringe since the building’s extensive renovation in the 2000s.

Václav Havelka leads the guitar band Please the Trees, whose fourth LP Carp picked up the prestigious Apollo prize for Czech LP of 2015. The Krkonoše-raised singer and songwriter also collaborates with lots of other musicians and regularly promotes concerts by major independent artists. Our tour of “Václav Havelka’s Prague” begins in a passageway between the streets Spálená and Opatovická that many residents probably have no idea exists. It’s home to Super Tramp Coffee, a newish café with wonderfully peaceful outdoor seating.

Currently running the arts website Proti šedi (Against the Grey), Jana Kománková has been a well-known figure on the Prague music scene for over two decades. The critic and Radio 1 DJ was born in the city and has lived her whole life in the Žižkov district. But our tour of “Jana Kománková’s Prague” starts in the adjacent neighbourhood of Vinohrady, specifically at the airy and stylish La Boheme café on Sázavská St.

Jan Valenta and Zuzka Daňková run Taste of Prague, a food tour company taking visitors to some of the city’s best cafés and restaurants. The couple also have a very impressive Prague Food Blog offering insider tips on the most happening spots in the Czech capital. Our tour of “their Prague” begins at EMA espresso bar, a cool, modern café just across the street from Masarykovo nádraží train station in the downtown area.

Alex Went is the man behind the Prague Vitruvius, a very impressive and useful website dedicated to the city’s architecture. Indeed, the Englishman, who works as head of communications at Prague College, probably knows a lot more about the Czech capital’s buildings and history than the vast majority of natives. In the first part of our tour of “his Prague”, Went gives me some fascinating into Moskevská St., the main drag in his Vršovice neighbourhood – beginning across the street from the “Rangherka” mansion.

Lukáš Houdek is a man of many activities. The coordinator of the government’s anti-racism Hate Free Culture project, he is also a photographer and curator as well as heading a publishers specialised in Romany literature. Houdek is from furthest West Bohemia and now lives in a village outside the capital. But for many years he called the Smíchov/Prague 5 district home – and it is there we begin our tour of “his Prague” at Cibulka, a rather hidden park.

Marek Hovorka is only based part-time in Prague. The rest of the time he lives in his hometown of Jihlava, where he has been running the Czech Republic’s most important documentary film festival for nearly two decades. When we caught up Hovorka was super busy, putting the finishing touches to the programme before the start of this year’s Jihlava in under a fortnight’s time. So instead of the usual My Prague format of visiting various spots, we discussed his relationship to the city at a café at Letenské náměstí in Prague 7, the district where he lives and works.

The frontman of Prague band The Prostitutes, Adrian T. Bell this year picked up the Apollo critic’s award for best Czech LP of the year for his solo debut, Different World. The Newcastle-born singer moved to Prague in 1993 and for most of the intervening period has lived just off Jiřího z Poděbrad square in the Vinohrady district. And it is there – beneath the shade of some trees on a sweltering day – that we begin our tour of “Adrian Bell’s Prague”.

TV journalist Nora Fridrichová presents the irreverent political programme 168 hodin (168 Hours), which famously unearthed the video of Václav Klaus pocketing a pen that became an international hit. From Pardubice in East Bohemia, Fridrichová came to the capital to study and today lives in the leafy Troja district. But our tour of “her Prague” begins in Karlín, which like several other districts near the city centre has become increasingly hip in recent years.

For nearly a decade Camille Hunt has been co-running Hunt Kastner, a private Prague gallery that represents leading local artists such as Eva Koťátková and Dominik Lang. In 2013 the gallery moved to Žižkov from the Letná district, which the Canadian-born Hunt has long called home. Our tour of “her Prague” begins with a drink on the terrace of the Letná Chateau, which is adjacent to a beer garden with stunning views of the city.

Born in Prague and living in the downtown area, photographer Eugen Kukla is highly knowledgeable about the history of his native city. Taking time out from preparing for an exhibition of his work that starts at Velryba café next week, he suggests we begin our tour of “his Prague” at the spot on Old Town Square where a Baroque Marian column stood for over 250 years. A member of an association pushing to have it rebuilt, Kukla explains how the monument was toppled in November 1918, shortly after the foundation of Czechoslovakia.

Michal Bregant is the director of the National Film Archive, which is tasked with preserving the Czech Republic’s rich cinema heritage and oversees over 150 million metres of film. Previously he headed another important institution, FAMU film school. A Praguer through and through, Bregant grew up on the city centre street Celetná. His family’s kitchen window overlooked the adjacent, narrow Kamzíkova – and there we take a short trip down memory lane at the start of our tour of “his Prague”.

Lori Wyant Selby and Dean Selby are a US couple who run two popular spots in Prague: burger restaurant The Tavern; and U Kurelů, an old-school pub they have refashioned with great success. Prior to opening their own places, Dean and Lori made a splash with their mobile Lokal burger business, which was involved in the early days of the city’s farmers’ markets.

Saint Petersburg-born actor Ivan Shvedoff has appeared in dozens of TV shows and films, including the likes of the fourth Mission Impossible movie. Most recently he has had a small part in a new Cold War project helmed by Steven Spielberg. Shvedoff has been living here in the Czech capital since the late 1990s, specifically in Vršovice. And it is there – in a cool, newish bar named Zenit – that our tour of “his Prague” begins.

A member of the country’s large Vietnamese community, Mimi Lan Nguyen came to the Czech Republic in the early 1990s while still in her early teens. Today she is a successful fashion designer with a flagship boutique on the capital’s Štěpánská St. The shop is actually on the outside of the grand city centre Lucerna Palace, and it was there that Mimi began introducing me to “her Prague”.

Leader of local indie pioneers The Ecstasy of St. Theresa and a successful composer of film scores, Jan P. Muchow is one of the most respected musicians and producers in the Czech Republic. He calls the now-hip Vršovice district home but works in the nearby Vinohrady. And we begin our tour of “Jan Muchow’s Prague” on the latter’s Jiřího z Poděbrad square, just around the corner from his relatively new studio.

Countless Hollywood movies and TV series have been shot in the Czech Republic in the last two decades. Casting director Nancy Bishop, who moved to Prague in 1994, has worked on many of those projects, from The Bourne Identity to Mission Impossible IV to the as yet unreleased Child 44. We began our tour of “her Prague” at Náměstí Míru, a square close to where she lives. As Bishop and I spoke, a passer-by tinkled the ivories on a free piano metres from our bench.Audio Player

Piotrek Gawlinski is a young Polish tour guide who has been happily based in the Czech capital for several years. Indeed, his love of the city inspired him to start Lost and Found in Prague, an excellent photoblog showcasing rare images from the pre-1989 period. We begin our tour of “Piotrek Gawlinski’s Prague” a short distance from his Vršovice home on the terrace of Vinohrady’s Gröbe Villa, known locally as Grebovka.

Adam Štěch writes for the leading Czech design magazine Dolce Vita, as well as high-end international outlets like the website Coolhunting and Mark magazine. He also takes part in projects around Europe as part of the Okolo design collective, which produces an impressive magazine of its own. Our tour of “Adam Štěch’s Prague” begins downtown on the plaza beside the National Theatre and behind the institution’s futuristic New Stage building.

Vadim Erent runs Insight Cities, a tour company that promises to give visitors a deeper perspective on the cultural and political histories of more than half a dozen cities, including Berlin and New York. The firm began here in Prague, where the Russian-born US citizen has been living for the last 11 years. And our tour of “Vadim Erent’s Prague” begins near his Letná home, specifically on a bench overlooking Stromovka Park by the Místodržitelský letohrádek, or Governor’s Summer Palace.

Among the small number of Czech directors in competition at the Karlovy Vary festival, which gets underway next weekend, will be documentarian Martin Dušek, with his latest work Into the Clouds We Gaze. The witty filmmaker, who comes from the North Bohemian town of Česká Lípa, suggests as the starting point for our tour of “his Prague” the place where he works. One of the city’s most distinctive Functionalist structures, it’s a large building by Vltavská metro station owned by developer Orco and currently home to rather rough and ready office spaces.

Poet, novelist and translator Justin Quinn has called Prague home since 1992. A professor of English at Charles University and the University of West Bohemia in Plzeň, the Irishman has lived in contrasting parts of the Czech capital, from Malá Strana (which we’ll visit later) to the concrete jungle of Jižní Město. But our tour of Justin Quinn’s Prague begins at another old ‘hood of his, Nusle – specifically at the foot of the Nuselské schody, or Nusle Steps. Why there?

Martin Pošta made a mark on Prague in October when his Signal festival of light installations and video mapping brought an estimated quarter of a million people onto the streets over one weekend. The Croatian-born film school graduate – and former director of Fresh Film Fest – lives on Polská St. in Vinohrady, right by Riegrovy sady park. On a bench overlooking the park’s longest slope, Martin Pošta explains why he’s chosen this particular spot to begin our tour of “his Prague”.

Glen Emery has been in Prague since the early 1990s and today owns the lively and cosmopolitan bar Bukowski’s in Žižkov. But the Canadian, a font of great anecdotes and with a keen interest in history, started out in the city with Jo’s Bar, just off the main square in Malá Strana, or the Lesser Quarter. In this edition of My Prague, Emery takes us on a short tour of the area, which lies below Prague Castle on the left bank of the River Vltava.

Who better to show us around “his Prague” than US author and journalist Mark Baker? After all, the seasoned travel writer has penned a number of guidebooks to the city since moving here at the very start of the 1990s. Our short tour begins in the district that Baker has called home in recent years, Bubeneč, a quiet, leafy part of Prague 6.