Three modernist icons have been added to Unesco’s World Heritage List

The Unesco World Heritage Committee has closed out its annual session with the decision to add 25 new sites to the World Heritage List. The additions span cultural and natural sites, from Iran's Alamūt Castle to Mongolia's Xiongnu nobility cemeteries and the historic medinas of the Comoros.

The list, reserved for places of ‘outstanding universal value to humanity’, increasingly embraces a newer category of heritage: 20th-century modernist architecture. Finnish works by architect Alvar Aalto and his collaborators, the modernist city centre of the Polish city of Gdynia, and the modernist architecture of Tashkent, Uzbekistan, have all been added to the list, signalling a growing recognition of modernism as the next frontier in heritage preservation.

Finland’s Aalto works

This designation covers 13 buildings across Finland constructed between 1928 and 1988, credited to architects Alvar Aalto, Aino Marsio-Aalto and Elissa Aalto and their studio. The buildings – a mix of civic, community and residential projects in both cities and rural areas – embody the modern movement's core aim of addressing social needs through architecture. The works are rooted in Finnish tradition, yet engaged with the international ideas sweeping through architecture over the 20th century.

Five of the 13 buildings are in Helsinki: the Aalto House and Studio Aalto in the Munkkiniemi suburb, the National Pensions Institute (KELA) building in the Töölö district, the House of Culture, and Finlandia Hall in the city centre. Visitors can explore the Aaltos' legacy further through a permanent exhibition at Finlandia Hall and a design museum exhibition running through January 2027. Finlandia Hall itself – refurbished between 2022 and 2025 – now offers short-stay apartments furnished with Aalto-designed pieces.

Gdynia, Poland

Unesco’s inclusion of city-centre Gdynia, on Poland’s Baltic coast, covers its key interwar-era streets and building blocks, showcasing how modernist planning principles were applied at scale to transform Gdynia into a major seaport for the first Polish Republic between the World Wars. The listing includes villas on Kamienna Góra hill and the surrounding residential architecture, which together mark a decisive break from historicist design traditions in Poland.

Tashkent, Uzbekistan

The Tashkent inscription recognises ten buildings constructed between the 1960s and early 1990s as part of the rapid reconstruction that followed the devastating earthquake that struck the Uzbek city in 1966. The buildings – which include museums, exhibition halls, hotels, a market, a metro station and residential complexes – show how Soviet-era planning merged with Central Asian spatial traditions, climate-responsive design and local craftsmanship to produce a distinctive architectural style.

The inscription makes Uzbekistan the first Central Asian country recognised for its 20th-century architectural heritage, and the buildings are now, by construction date, the youngest structures to hold World Heritage status.

A broader shift

The addition of these sites to the Unesco World Heritage List signals a wider reassessment within the heritage world of what counts as historically significant – extending protection not just to ancient monuments, but to the concrete, glass and steel of the 20th century.