In 1938 the Czech PEN Club, a branch of the worldwide PEN International association of writers, decided to build a chalet on the eastern outskirts of the village Budislav with the encouragement of the writer Karel Čapek. This chalet was to serve as a retreat where Czechoslovak writers could meet, rest and work.
The design for a modern, low-cost building was undertaken by the architect Stanislav Tobek, a pupil and co-designer of Gočár, who was a devotee of “Minimalist” forms and whose work was influenced by scientific Functionalism during the 1930s. However, the recreational building in Budislav shows that the designer was capable of breaking away from his “strict” Modernist principles. His concept was of a light, two-storey, wooden building of seasonal character, resting on massive stone foundations. The facade was broken up by rows of balconies with slatted railings and by patios at the sides. A low pitched roof with a considerable overhang gave the impression of a flat roof. The building had a “recreational” appearance accentuated by wooden shutters.
The interior, with a longitudinal layout in three sections, contained fourteen, predominantly single, en-suite rooms, accessible through a central corridor featuring visible wooden framework.
Due to the political climate in the occupied state and fears over the club property being confiscated, Litomyšl town council took over the building, intending to return it as soon as the occupying forces were expulsed. Construction work was left unfinished intentionally – the well was not dug and interior fittings were not finished. Negotiations concerning the completion of the PEN Club building were renewed after liberation in 1945. However, it was not until 1948 that the building was finished.
Even though an annex was added to the rear façade of the building in the 1970s, the building remained basically authentic, albeit in rundown condition, (the electrical wiring and cast-iron radiators, etc. survived). In 2017, a sensitive reconstruction was carried out following the original construction process and using natural materials (above all, sandstone from local quarries and wood). The grounds themselves were also modified, where a new, dome-shaped wooden building designed by Jiří Mojžíš was built to serve as an education centre for ecology.
