Renovation of the Supreme Court building goes to competition for the second time. A second court has been added and the construction estimate has risen by twelve million

The Office of the Supreme Court of the Slovak Republic has announced a competition for an architectural design for the renovation of the building on Župné námestie in Bratislava. The building by Vladimír Dedeček is to become the joint seat of the Supreme Court and the Supreme Administrative Court, and the deadline for submitting proposals is October 26 at ten o'clock. This is the second attempt — the court cancelled the previous competition last year shortly before the submission of final proposals. SME ↗

What the Court Announced

According to the Office of the Supreme Court, the renovation is necessary because of the building's insufficient technical condition and its demanding energy and economic operation, which prevent its potential from being fully used. The competition is meant to find a design that will create a dignified and modern seat for both institutions, contribute to more efficient use of public resources, and at the same time preserve Vladimír Dedeček's architectural legacy. The new brief is to build on his original concept of two clearly separated parts within one building that share common spaces. TASR ↗

Unlike the cancelled competition, this one, according to the competition rules, is single-stage, public and anonymous, open to an unlimited number of participants. The first prize is 33,300 euros, the second 26,700 and the third 20,000 euros; a further 12,500 euros is allocated for awards to unplaced entries, with the jury deciding on their distribution and no individual award being lower than 4,000 euros. In total, 92,500 euros is allocated for prizes and awards. Competition conditions, Supreme Court Office ↗

The schedule is set out in the conditions through the end of the year. After the October 26 deadline, verification of the proposals is to follow, then a jury meeting on November 16, notification of results to participants on November 27, and publication of the results and the competition entries on December 8, 2026. Prizes and awards are to be paid out within thirty days of publication. Competition conditions, Supreme Court Office ↗

The Office of the Supreme Court prepared the competition in cooperation with the Office of the Supreme Administrative Court and had the conditions verified by the Slovak Chamber of Architects. Supreme Court President František Mozner considers renovation a more demanding path than new construction, but also the only one that preserves the architectural work for future generations. "That is why we insisted that the competition also be verified by the Slovak Chamber of Architects, since we want to be certain it meets the highest professional standards," he added. SME ↗

The Construction Estimate Is Higher by Almost Twelve Million

The competition conditions state estimated construction investment costs of 54,063,628 euros excluding VAT. In February 2025, when the court announced the first competition, spokesperson Alexandra Važanová cited 42,240,000 euros excluding VAT for the same building — but at that time still for the Supreme Court alone, not for two institutions. The difference between the published estimates is 11,823,628 euros, or roughly 28 percent. Competition conditions, Supreme Court Office ↗ SITA ↗

So this is not a price increase for the same task. In the meantime the brief changed, and no budget comparison of the two versions has been published, so it cannot be determined from the available documents what caused the difference. The conditions themselves also note that this is an estimate, not a competitively tendered price: "The competition serves to verify the estimated investment costs of the construction and may be an indicator for their possible updating." Competition conditions, Supreme Court Office ↗

The design fee is also derived from the investment costs via the UNIKA fee schedule. The estimated value of the follow-up contract for design and architectural services, which the court will award to the winner through direct negotiation, is 4,983,326 euros excluding VAT. Together with the prizes and awards, the total estimated contract value is 5,075,826 euros excluding VAT. In 2025 this was 4,000,000 euros for services and 180,000 euros for prizes and awards, i.e. 4,180,000 euros in total. Competition conditions, Supreme Court Office ↗ Slovak Chamber of Architects ↗

The new competition allocates a lower amount for prizes and awards than a year and a half ago. However, the difference itself cannot be described as a saving: the original competition was two-stage and guaranteed 20,000 euros to each of the five finalists for their work in the second stage, whereas the single-stage format does not have a second stage at all. Slovak Chamber of Architects ↗

One more sentence from the announcement notice belongs here. In it, the contracting authority informed participants that at the time the competition was announced, it did not have financial coverage for the costs associated with the procedure that is to follow it, namely the direct negotiation procedure. At the same time, it expects that by the time that procedure begins it will already have approved funds, since its goal is to implement the project in full. SME ↗

The First Competition Was Cancelled Eight Days Before Submission

The court announced the first international competition on February 12, 2025, still under President Ján Šikuta. It was two-stage; by April 30, 2025, twenty author teams had entered the first stage, and a jury led by Monika Mitášová selected five of them to advance. They were to submit their final designs on September 5, 2025. Slovak Chamber of Architects ↗

The court cancelled the competition on August 28, 2025, eight days before that deadline. The reason was a change in the brief: the new president, František Mozner, raised the idea of bringing the Supreme Court and the Supreme Administrative Court — which is based at a different address — under one roof, and he and the president of the administrative court agreed that the building on Župné námestie was suitable for this. According to the court's office, continuing the competition under the changed circumstances would not have been transparent or fair to the participants. ASB ↗

The Slovak Chamber of Architects published a statement on September 2, 2025, and its objection targeted the timing. According to the chamber, the organizer cancelled the competition at a moment when participants had their designs almost finished. The chamber stressed the need to properly conclude the competition and pay out the guaranteed awards for participation in the second stage, and warned that such a course of events could undermine the trust of both former and new participants in future competitions. At the same time, it welcomed the fact that, unlike in the similarly cancelled competition for the Slovak National Museum, in this case there was at least a meeting between the courts' leadership and representatives of the chamber. Slovak Chamber of Architects ↗

Finalists Signed Settlement Agreements

The cancellation had a sequel. On September 22, 2025, the chamber reported that the court's office had sent draft settlement agreements to the five second-stage finalists, and the participants signed them, creating the conditions for paying out the proposed financial compensation. No one filed an appeal against the cancellation of the competition. The chamber did not disclose the specific amount of the compensation or confirmation that it had already been paid. Slovak Chamber of Architects ↗

At the time, the chamber also stated that further progress would likely require drawing up a new verification study that would take detailed account of the current requirements of both judicial institutions. The new competition came eleven months later. Slovak Chamber of Architects ↗

Dedeček's Building and the Demolition Debate

Dedeček designed the building at Župné námestie 13 between 1977 and 1978; construction lasted from 1984 to 1991. It is a six-story building with an interior atrium, with eight courtrooms lit from above on the ground floor. Characteristic features include the folded north and south façades cantilevered over the ground floor, which create a covered walkway along the sides. The façade consists of light-colored Kanfanar cladding stone from Croatia combined with prefabricated concrete panels. Register of Modern Architecture ↗

The question of whether to renovate or demolish the building had been debated for years. The court approached the Metropolitan Institute of Bratislava for cooperation in 2022, and it prepared a feasibility study with three variants: renovation, demolition with a larger new building, and demolition with a smaller building. In the summer of 2023 the study recommended renovation as the more economically advantageous variant, with renovation coming to just over 30 million euros excluding VAT, against just under 44 million and over 50 million for the two new-construction variants. ASB ↗

At the time, the YIM.BA portal described the technical condition as catastrophic: leaking roofs, leaking windows, burst pipes, sewage problems, and poor thermal insulation. It also noted that an older cost estimate from previous years had been only 15 to 17 million euros, and that the whole process, including project preparation, would take at least eight years, with completion no earlier than 2031. This is a historical estimate from before the cancelled competition, and a completion date under the new brief cannot be derived from it. YIM.BA ↗

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Photo: the building of the Supreme Court of the Slovak Republic on Župné námestie in Bratislava, to which the competition relates. Photo: Wizzard / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0