ABSTRACT
The transformation of post-socialist cities is facilitated not only by anti-communist reactions, but also by a set of contemporary social, economic and cultural processes, which shape the urban landscape of Central European cities. Non interventionist landscape management models and tools were often considered to be the very best solutions to post-socialist administration procedures and were widely applied in many post-socialist countries and cities. Foreign investors played a very important role in facilitating post-socialist landscapes. Arkadia is one of Central Europe's largest shopping centres, boasting the stores selling domestic and foreign brands, restaurants, cafs and a cinema, all of them under a single roof, surrounded by landscape of simulacrum: glass rooftops, high street-like galleries, mosaic tiling and natural stone walls. By creating self-assured images and symbols, private companies try to stamp an artificial collective identity onto the consumer. New functional elements have been implemented into the New European' landscapes, as copies of mainly American solutions.
