Prague’s Wenceslas Square has always been where the cultural, political, and—as uninspired as it might be—the commercial come together.
In the 1920s and ‘30s, the former “Horse Market” was the verifiable salon of the city, a spot for high society to meet and mingle. In 1969, it was the site of student Jan Palach’s protest of the country’s Soviet occupation, when he, unforgettably, lit himself on fire. And in 1989, it was where hundreds of thousands gathered during the Velvet Revolution, which would go on to take down communism in then-Czechoslovakia. It was home to important companies and publishing houses, and up until the last part of the 20th century considered the center of Prague.
