GračaniA village of old Gradec below Sljeme, with a tram and a cable car

Gračani at a glance

• To the main square by ZET33 min
• To the centre as the crow flies5.1 km
• Committee residents (2021)²6,284
• Altitude¹273 m

Where Gračani is

Gračani is on the southern slopes of Medvednica, directly below Sljeme, at 273 metres above sea level.¹ Officially it belongs to the Podsljeme city district and is covered by Mjesni odbor Gračani, the first of the district's five local committees (the others are Markuševec, Mlinovi, Šestine and Vidovec), based at Isce 15.^2,3,4 Gračani is not a separate settlement today: under the 2009 decision the committee covers part of the settlement of Zagreb.⁴ Neighbourhoods have no official boundaries, so this guide describes Gračani through that committee.

The committee area reaches the City boundary on the Medvednica ridge to the north and borders Markuševec to the east, the Maksimir and Gornji grad – Medveščak districts to the south, and Šestine to the west, up to just below the TV tower.⁴ Towards Šestine the boundary is the undeveloped valley of the Topličica stream.⁷

For and against: life in Gračani

What life is like in Gračani

Gračani lies in a valley ringed by hills, crossed by the Gračanec, Pustodol, Bliznec and Topličica streams; according to Croatian Wikipedia, the Topličica rises from a thermal spring.⁷ The place has long been a favourite excursion spot,¹ and in the 1960s, according to the historian Domagoj Novosel, it was the city's best-known one, with a string of inns.¹⁵

Gračani people were known as millers, butchers and weavers, and at Bliznec most people lived from milling.^1,15 Women from Gračani and Markuševec sold their produce mainly on Trg bana Jelačića, the main square, and later at Dolac market.^1,15

Across the Podsljeme district, family houses at low density are the norm, and three- and four-room flats are the most common (2011 census).⁶ Near the cable car and the shopping centre, HRT reported in 2020, rows of multi-storey blocks of flats have stood for years.²⁸ According to the architecture archive nextroom, three terraced buildings designed by njiric+ arhitekti went up at Gračansko borje in 2005–2006, with two-storey flats of 100 to 190 m²; the scheme won the Drago Galić prize in 2007.²³

According to Novosel, a large wave of newcomers reached Gračani, Remete and Gornji Bukovec in the 1960s, especially from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Local families sold building plots, and the people he interviewed linked the change to the tram.¹⁵ Between 2001 and 2011 the committee area's population grew by 19%, and at the 2021 census it had 6,284 residents on 1,215 hectares.^6,2

The family of the skiers Janica and Ivica Kostelić bought a house and lived in Gračani. In March 2011 some 500 neighbours threw Ivica a homecoming party in front of the "Tunel", as the unfinished tunnel at Dolje is known.^22,52,15

Isce

The rise with St Michael's church, the oldest part of Gračani; according to IKA, first recorded in 1201 as Mons Ixes.⁹

Bliznec

A stream valley once full of watermills, with a toll post where people paid to enter Zagreb; today one of the main entrances to Medvednica Nature Park.^42,15

Zvečaj

Pope John Paul II passed along the Zvečaj road on 3 October 1998 on his way to Marija Bistrica, and a marble cross has marked it since 2013.⁴⁵

Where the name Gračani comes from

The name Gračani marks its people as belonging to Gradec, the free royal town that is today's Gornji grad, the Upper Town; the village began as a settlement of Gradec's serfs.^8,7,1 According to Kristian Strukić, a historian at the Zagreb City Museum, Gradec's 1615 urbar (land register) gives the village's official name as Gračan.⁸

The name first appears in 1334, in a list of villages that owed tithes to the Zagreb church.^9,8,7 According to Novosel, it gradually spread to the neighbouring villages.¹⁵

A short history of Gračani

With his Golden Bull of 1242, King Béla IV gave Gradec a belt of land from Sljeme to the Sava, and according to Strukić the Gračani area was part of it.⁸ Gradec, the cathedral chapter of Kaptol, the Pauline monks of Remete and the lords of Medvedgrad all disputed the village.^7,9 From 16th-century city accounts Strukić shows that Gračani people hauled stone for Gradec, worked the town's vineyards and served as hunters and as couriers as far as Krapina.⁸

In the 1615 urbar Gračani, with 21 houses, was the largest village on the town's land.^8,1 The chapel of St Michael is first recorded in 1622.^10,9 In 1838 Ivan Puntijar opened Gračani's first inn and shop.^20,15 The first school was built in 1904; until then children walked to Remete and Šestine.^12,7

In 1921 the administrative municipality of Gračani was formed. Its seat moved to Remete in 1927, and it kept the name Gračani until 1937, when it became the municipality of Remete.^13,12 At the end of the Second World War and after it, many people were killed and buried in Gračani. Excavations from 2013 to 2018 found 294 victims, and on 23 August 2019 they were buried in a common grave beside St Michael's church.^9,10,51

Gračani became part of Zagreb after the Second World War. The areas of the local people's committees below Sljeme were joined to the City at the end of 1949, and in 1950 Gračani went into the city's second district (II. rajon), Medveščak.^1,13,14 The tram line from Mihaljevac to Dolje opened on 15 September 1950, and the first Sljeme cable car on 27 July 1963.^15,40,27 Gračani became a parish of its own in 1983.^10,9 The 2020 earthquakes badly damaged St Michael's, especially its bell tower; the restoration was finished in August 2022,^10,9 the year the new cable car began running.^26,27

1. 1334The name Gračani first appears, in a list of villages owing tithes.^9,8,7
2. 1615Gradec's urbar lists Gračani as the largest village on the town's land, with 21 houses.^8,1
3. 1622The chapel of St Michael is first recorded, in a church visitation.^10,9
4. 1838Ivan Puntijar opens the first inn and shop in Gračani.^20,15
5. 1904The first school starts teaching on 21 November.¹²
6. 1907Young men of Gračani found the singing society Podgorac.^22,7
7. 1950The tram line from Mihaljevac to Dolje opens.^15,40
8. 1963The first cable car to Sljeme opens.^15,27
9. 1983The parish of St Michael, Gračani, is founded.^10,9
10. 2014The Meridijan 16 shopping centre opens at Gračanska cesta 208.^24,25
11. 2022The new cable car to Sljeme starts from Gračansko Dolje.^26,27

What to see in Gračani

• St Michael's church

  A single-nave church in a walled churchyard on the Isce rise (Isce 33a), protected cultural property.^9,10,21 Its building date is unknown; the chapel is first recorded in 1622 and got its masonry bell tower in 1750.^9,10 Since 2019 the churchyard has held the common grave of 294 victims from the end of the war and the years after it.^10,51

• Sts Peter and Paul, Bešići

  The church is a bought family house that was once a mill on the Bliznec stream. The millstone still sits under the altar and holds up the altar table.^11,35,36

• The Gračanski Ribnjak watermill

  Banić's mill at Gračanski ribnjak 20 is the last of what local tradition says were 13 mills on the Ribnjak stream. Grain has been milled here since 1773, and the mill, built of hewn oak beams, still grinds for the Banić family and for visitors.^44,43 It is a protected ethnological building.²¹

• The old village school

  Gračani's first school, from 1904, renovated in 2007. According to HRT it is entered in the Register of Cultural Goods, and the community nursing service uses it. In October 2026 the local committee asked for its roof, windows and doors to be repaired.^12,34

• The Puntijar farmstead

  The family farmstead at Gračanska cesta 65 is protected cultural property.²¹ In 2003 the Zagreb City Museum wrote about the Stari Puntijar restaurant at this address and its gastro-museum of old books on cooking, butchery, wine and medicinal herbs.²⁰

• The Bliznec forest trail

  The 800 m trail starts at the Bliznec info centre, is built for wheelchair users and has texts in Braille as well; since 2003 it has had a Way of the Cross.⁴¹ The Park lists it as officially closed for technical reasons, so walking it is at your own risk.⁴¹

• The Pustodol spring shrine

  A statue of Our Lady stands in a stone niche by the spring, and carved beneath it is 1934, the year the water network reached Gračani.⁴⁵

Did you know?

• 1In the First World War the Austro-Hungarian army took three of St Michael's bells. According to IKA, villagers hid the fourth, from 1786, in manure, and it is now in the Museum of Arts and Crafts.⁹
• 2The first Sljeme cable car (1963–2007) was 4,017 m long and, according to Wikipedia, the longest single-drive installation of its kind in Europe.²⁷
• 3According to its own chronology, the music school now called Glazbeno učilište Elly Bašić started teaching inside OŠ Gračani in 1963/64.⁴⁶
• 4According to Medvednica Nature Park, an altar to Jupiter was found in a former quarry at Bliznec.⁴²

Everyday life in Gračani

Renting in Gračani

Nearby neighbourhoods

• MlinoviNeighbourhood guide
• RemeteNeighbourhood guide
• ŠestineNeighbourhood guide
• BukovacNeighbourhood guide
• MarkuševecNeighbourhood guide
• JelenovacNeighbourhood guide

• Compare districts: Podsljeme and Črnomerec
• Compare districts: Podsljeme and Gornja Dubrava
• Compare districts: Podsljeme and Upper Town – Medveščak
• All Zagreb neighbourhood guides

Questions about life in Gračani