KustošijaHouses along the Kustošak, the railway and Grmoščica forest

Kustošija at a glance

• To the main square by ZET27 min
• To the centre as the crow flies3.9 km
• Residents, three local committees combined (2021)^12,13,1413,019
• Grmoščica park-forest^27,4853.3 ha

Where Kustošija is

Kustošija is in the west of Zagreb, between Vrapče, central Črnomerec and Mikulići.¹ The neighbourhood has no official boundaries, but three local committees (mjesni odbori) in two city districts carry its name. Gornja Kustošija and Kustošija – centar are two of the eight in the Črnomerec district, and Donja Kustošija belongs to the neighbouring Stenjevec district.^15,12,13,14 This guide describes Kustošija through those three committees.

In the 2011 census Kustošija is not a settlement in its own right: its names appear only among the local committees within the settlement of Zagreb, and the Donja Kustošija committee was then called Matija Gubec.^44,14 Gornja and Donja Kustošija were once two villages. The school district of 1904 covered both, and the municipality founded in 1937 listed them as separate places.^4,2

For and against: life in Kustošija

What life is like in Kustošija

Kustošija is mostly a neighbourhood of family houses. The school describes Kustošija – centar that way, in 2024 the City called Gornja Kustošija a growing family neighbourhood, and in 2018 the parish priest told Glas Koncila that 60 to 70 per cent of people in the parish live in houses.^6,22,30 According to the same priest, old houses are being sold and replaced by small blocks of flats, and there are a few larger buildings too.³⁰ The school notes new homes going up around its Gornja Kustošija branch every year.⁶

In 2018 Glas Koncila wrote of about 14,000 residents along the Kustošak brook, the railway and Grmoščica forest: newcomers, the children and grandchildren of former workers and craftsmen, and old local families. The same article found Gornja and Donja Kustošija quieter than busy Ilica.³⁰ Taken together, the three committee areas had 14,040 residents at the 2011 census and 13,019 at the 2021 census (the sum of the figures for each committee).^{44,1,12,13,14}

The 2022 sociological analysis describes Kustošija as historically the edge of the city, with a border and a toll gate; the population is densest along Ilica.⁴⁹ Zagreb's master plan (GUP) lists Kustošija and Južna Kustošija among areas of individual house building marked for upgrading and urban renewal.⁴⁷

Since 2022 the former brickworks by the Črnomerec terminus has been the Ciglana city project, covering about 14.2 hectares. Its theme is converting old industry, and a public competition is required. A separate city project covers the Kustošija market.^26,49 The 2025 amendments to the master plan count the market among the features that give the city's urban areas their identity,⁴⁷ and the City announced a programme called Plac u fokusu (The market in focus) there for 17 October 2026, with a panel on the market's future.³⁴

Gornja Kustošija

The largest of the three committee areas, in the Črnomerec district: 481.54 ha and 6,759 residents at the 2021 census. It is based at Kustošijanska ulica 276.¹²

Kustošija – centar

A committee area in the Črnomerec district, based at Ilica 259: 99.54 ha and 2,852 residents at the 2021 census.¹³

Donja Kustošija

A committee area in the Stenjevec district, based at Zagrebačka cesta 88: 32.28 ha and 3,408 residents at the 2021 census.¹⁴

Where the name Kustošija comes from

Kustošija takes its name from the canon custos who looked after this area when it was an estate of the Zagreb chapter at Kaptol.^1,36,30 In a cathedral chapter the custos is the canon who oversees the cathedral; the word is Latin for keeper.¹¹

When the name arose is uncertain. In a 1969 catalogue for the Croatian History Museum, Mirko Valentić links it to the house of the canon custos Ivan Znika on Kaptol (now number 28), which became the residence of all the custodes and was itself called "kustošija". Valentić supposes that the area got its name only after 1723, partly because the custodes held estates there. Citing some accounts, he adds that a canon custos's building also stood in Kustošija itself, on the main road by a crossroads, and was likewise called kustošija.⁴³

A short history of Kustošija

According to the City's history of the Črnomerec district, finds in Donja Kustošija point to people living here in the Stone Age, and a Roman road from Medvednica to the Sava ran from Ilica via Sveti Duh, Kustošija and the southern part of Grmoščica.⁵ The same page says a nobleman named Petar gave the land called Grmoščica to the Kaptol chapter in the Middle Ages.⁵ In 1697 the canon custos Ivan Znika set up an iron cross on a stone base in Kustošija.⁴³

The railways to Zidani Most (1862) and Karlovac (1865) sped up the economic growth of the city's western edge.⁵ In 1885 Adolf Müller founded the brickworks that later traded as Ciglane Zagreb.^10,5 A one-class school for Kustošija was founded in 1904, at first in a rented house at Ilica 229.⁴ When the newspapers debated joining Kustošija to Zagreb in 1932, opponents in the city called it a burden, while Kustošija argued that the city would gain the industry that had settled just outside its boundary.^36,1 According to Večernji list, the press of the time put Kustošija's population at 4,277 and reported that the tram would be extended to Stenjevec; in 2013 Večernji noted that this never happened.³⁶

By a decree of the royal regents on 18 November 1937, Kustošija was split off from the municipality of Vrapče as a municipality of its own, with its seat in Donja Kustošija. It took in Frateršćica, Černomerec, Gorenci, Gornja and Donja Kustošija, Ljubljanica and Rudeš, and had about 8,000 people.^2,3 From the start it campaigned to join Zagreb.³ The parish of Blessed Nikola Tavelić was carved out of the Sveti Duh and Vrapče parishes on 29 June 1939.^7,8 According to Vatican News, it was the first parish placed under his patronage.⁴⁰ The church was built from 1941 to 1943, and Archbishop Alojzije Stepinac consecrated it on 14 November 1943.^7,8,40

In 1942 the German army took over both school buildings, and lessons moved to the former Vrapče municipal building and to the brickworks.⁴ Allied bombing aimed at the railway hit Kustošija several times. According to the parish history, a row of houses in lower Kustošija was destroyed (the site of today's market was once built up), and the convent chapel took a direct hit.⁸ Until 1945 the city boundary ran along the Kustošak brook. That year Kustošija became part of Zagreb, and until 1947 it was a separate VII city rajon.^3,5 From 1955 it belonged to the municipality of Susedgrad, which merged into Črnomerec in 1962.^3,5

1. 1697The canon custos Ivan Znika sets up an iron cross on a stone base in Kustošija.⁴³
2. 1885Adolf Müller founds the brickworks, later Ciglane Zagreb.^10,5
3. 1904Kustošija's school opens on 15 November in a rented house at Ilica 229.⁴
4. 1932The press debates joining Kustošija to Zagreb.^36,1
5. 1937On 18 November Kustošija becomes a municipality of its own, split off from Vrapče.^2,3
6. 1939The parish of Blessed Nikola Tavelić is founded.^7,8
7. 1943Archbishop Stepinac consecrates the parish church.^7,8
8. 1945Kustošija joins Zagreb and is a separate VII city rajon until 1947.³
9. 1962The municipality of Susedgrad, which includes Kustošija, merges into Črnomerec.^3,5
10. 1964NK Metalac merges with the Kustošija club and gets the ground in Sokolska ulica.³⁷
11. 2001A concert organ by Wolfgang Julius Braun is installed in the church.^9,30,39
12. 2006The brickworks stops making bricks.¹⁰
13. 2021The brickworks' last two chimneys are blasted down.^28,29
14. 2024The City puts the design of a new school in Gornja Kustošija out to tender.²²

What to see in Kustošija

• Church of St Nikola Tavelić

  At Ulica svetog Nikole Tavelića 2. The engineer Jaromir Dubsky designed it from a concept sketch by the writer Miroslav Krleža.^39,41,42 According to hr.wikipedia, drawing on a book by Zorana Sokol Gojnik, the church stands right on the street line with no forecourt and is marked by its bell tower.³⁹

• The church organ

  A large mechanical concert organ by Wolfgang Julius Braun, installed in November 2001. It has three manuals and, according to the parish, 40 speaking stops. The parish considers it the most valuable in Zagreb after the cathedral's, and holds an organ series, Orgulje u Kustošiji, every June.^9,30,39

• Ciglana

  The former brickworks by the Črnomerec tram terminus, at Ilica 288. Of its five chimneys, two were still standing in 2021, 49.8 and 62.2 metres tall. Damaged in the 2020 earthquakes, they were blasted down at noon on 21 February 2021.^28,29,10

• Traces of the clay conveyor

  Remains of the line that carried clay from the Grmoščica pit to the brickworks survive in Kustošijanska ulica. The pit opened in 1935, and from 1980 it was the brickworks' only source of clay.^10,35

• Müllerov brijeg

  The slope above the brickworks. The Croatian Technical Encyclopaedia places the first modern industrial farm here, with fruit plantations and vineyards, and clay was dug on the hill until 1979–80.¹⁰ The master plan protects Müllerov breg as a landscape.⁴⁷

• Grmoščica park-forest

  About 53 hectares of oak, beech, hornbeam, black locust, poplar and white pine between the Vrapčak and Kustošak brooks, Ilica and the road to Graberje; the highest point is 240 metres.^27,48 It has a five-a-side pitch, three downhill bike trails, an outdoor gym, an outdoor classroom, a nature trail and swings at the Vidikovac lookout.²⁷ According to the Augustin Cesarec culture and film centre, the walk up from the Črnomerec terminus to the lookout takes about 30 minutes.³⁵

• The Kustošak brook

  A stream from Medvednica named after Kustošija. It flows past the school's main building and on through Rudeš, Ljubljanica and Jarun towards the Sava.^38,6 The master plan protects the Kustošak valley with the Gorenci, Krvarići and Završje meadows, and also provides for diverting the brook into the culverted Črnomerec stream.⁴⁷

• The OŠ Kustošija building

  The school's main building at Sokolska 7 is a protected cultural property, register number Z-3930.^47,20

Did you know?

• 1The base of Znika's 1697 cross was a stone capital carved with leaves, probably Roman according to Valentić. Canon Franjo Budicki gave it in 1903 to the museum that is now the Croatian History Museum, where it has inventory number 6728.⁴³
• 2As the site Hrvatska povijest reports, on 17 February 1975 Krleža pointed the church out to his friend Enes Čengić while driving through Črnomerec and said he had "made the concept sketches" for it.⁴²
• 3Archbishop Stepinac turned down St Aloysius, patron of the convent chapel, as the parish's patron so that no one would think he had named it after himself (Alojzije).^8,30
• 4In February 2023 NK Kustošija signed the 18-year-old Senegalese defender Mikayil Faye. After 14 games he joined Barcelona's reserve side on 19 June 2023, for a fee Index.hr reported as €5 million.^37,50,51

Everyday life in Kustošija

Renting in Kustošija

Nearby neighbourhoods

• ČrnomerecNeighbourhood guide
• VoltinoNeighbourhood guide
• Sveti DuhNeighbourhood guide
• VrapčeNeighbourhood guide
• RudešNeighbourhood guide
• LjubljanicaNeighbourhood guide

• Compare districts: Črnomerec and Upper Town – Medveščak
• Compare districts: Črnomerec and Podsljeme
• Compare districts: Črnomerec and Podsused – Vrapče
• All Zagreb neighbourhood guides

Questions about life in Kustošija