The Conversion of Office Buildings into Hotels in the Historic District: Legislative Benefits

Abstract

Conversion, as a type of building adaptation, is becoming an increasingly common kind of architectural practice in many cities. Various aspects of this topic are the subject of numerous analyses and research interests, mostly, focused on drivers and obstacles of the conversion process. Although the conversion is still not sufficiently present in modern construction practice in Belgrade, several office building conversions to luxury hotels were completed on the territory of the central historic districts. Also, many vacant heritage buildings were noticed. Considering the above mentioned, the Serbian standards for classifying hotels into categories are analyzed, to examine the difference between the procedures for conversion of heritage buildings and non-heritage buildings into hotels, in terms of application of the standards. Although the status of heritage buildings, in many cases, can be an obstacle in the process of building conversion, this paper presents the legislative benefits of converting heritage office buildings into hotels.