Never mind the balconies

I derive great pleasure from watching other people’s behaviour when they are utterly unaware that someone else is observing them. However, watching your neighbours in Poland isn’t easy. We are not a nation of exhibitionists and like to hide our privacy behind curtains and blinds. But no one seems that bothered about leaving dirty boots by the door or junk on the balcony. And as much as it might be understandable to keep your bike on the balcony or dry your washing there (which is also frowned upon, but clothes need to dry somewhere and the best place is in the open air), it still never ceases to amaze me how carefree we are in the uses we put our balconies to, storing our winter tyres on them, along with surplus furniture, artificial Christmas trees and broken washing machines. Balconies, which were originally designed as summer recreational spaces, have instead taken on the roles of storage lockers, pantries, junk rooms and even billboards for broadcasting our views. So I will take this opportunity to peer more closely at these appendages to our homes…

The Polish balcony is an architectural curiosity. Those in old communist blocks are particularly fascinating, as they bear the scars of many years of experimental decoration. You can see them in Warsaw’s Gocław, Bielany and Ursynów districts and also in every other Polish town where prefabricated housing was built en masse in the 1970s, where these high-rise buildings shimmer in the sun like so many Rubik’s cubes. On every floor, you’ll find balconies of different styles and colours as well as those with their own unique aesthetics. There will be those covered in wickerwork, others fenced by bars and underneath them those surrounded by nets to keep the owner’s cat in. Next to that there’ll be one clad in panelling and below it another that’s fully glazed. And we haven’t yet mentioned the inevitable Provençal-style balcony. More colour is added by TV aerials, satellite dishes, washing lines, corrugated steel roofs and expertly painted railings. The ladders installed on ground-floor apartment balconies are yet another attraction. The residents of old blocks can be quite inventive when It comes to creating such exits onto the gardens surrounding their buildings with stairs made of brick, wood or steel and sometimes through the use of folding ladders. No two exits are ever the same.

The more modern buildings in our housing stock tend to be far more orderly at first glance, but even with them there’s a lack of a consistent style and aesthetics. Their balconies are often adorned with fake greenery “growing” through wicker, along with pergolas, plexiglass, swings, hammocks and playhouses. On the right you might see a minimalist balcony, but on the left there’s an urban jungle, and in the middle there will be an Ikea showcase balcony replete with lamps, carpets and cushions.

Balconies can also be pulpits for broadcasting your opinions. Almost every block in every town and city has at least one flag. This could be a rainbow flag, a Papal flag, an EU flag, or it could be the red and white Polish flag, or (for pro-choice advocates) a streak of lightning or a clothes hanger. And since last year it might even be a Ukrainian flag. This autumn, as happens every four years, Polish balconies will become platforms for declaring political positions, as election posters are plastered over sections of wickerwork and corrugated steel. Although we Poles like to protect our privacy, this is often overridden by a very powerful urge to express our views. A man’s home might be his castle, so why don’t we pay any attention to how it looks from the outside? Some people have obviously not been taught how to do this and there’s no legal means of enforcing it. Which is a pity. How our balconies are presented might be fantastic food for prying eyes, but they do also ruin the view.