Uzupis is an area partly falling in the designated area of Vilnius Old Town - a World Heritage site. It lies across the crook of the Vilnia (the smaller of two in Vilnius) river from the previously fortified nucleus of the Old Town, climbing north-eastwards from the lower river valley terrace up the hills surrounding the confluence of Vilnia and Neris.

The Uzupis of today is (and has been so during discernible span of history) a residential hamlet of the Old Town. In the course of time, however, during the World Wars the rank of its inhabitants has declined from wealthy craftsmen speckled with an odd nobility urban domicile to lumpen workers, thieves, and (some say-inferior) liberal artists. This period has also added the southeastern part of the area covering the hill with some one-story one family wooden huts. The degradation in contents was promptly followed by decay of the frame - in many buildings the facilities have never been installed (or were removed?) despite the relative progress of new soviet-style areas around. Some evidence of mature socialism also came down to the north east of Uzupis in the shape of five-storey redbrick multi-storey housing of the late Seventies.

One can thoroughly despise quite a number (that is, all except two or three) of decrepit (forsaken and still inhabited) historic buildings in the lower, older part of Uzupis, dating from 16th century (the Benedictine nunnery and the basements of buildings on both sides of Malunu [mills] street) to the turn of the century (most of the current facades. Yet the area beams a perceptible quality difficult to just ignore.

The overlay of the superb natural setting, fair variety of urban space and, perhaps, genius loci has not been unnoticed by the liberal community of the town. The first swallows of the unmoving intellectuals of the late seventies and early eighties grew into a steady, if thin, inflow in the middle of the last decade of the century. The swing in the population type of the area hopefully gives a chance to the birth of the vital local fraternity capable not just of odd performance of arts but also able to consolidate into a fundamental community to drive and sustain the revitalisation of the area.

Southwards across the Vilnia lie former Paplavu, now Paupys, suburb-the west of which has disappeared under a transit road while the east has fallen victim to late 19 c. industrialisation of the river valley, factories now place by side of the remaining housing from the turn of the century.

In its urban function, Uzupis area suffers most from division from the nucleus of the Old Town. The area represents a multitude and variety of problems - from lack of utilities and deterioration to social decay. Yet it opens possibilities well responding to the vision of retaining the essential housing area with a mix of other functions, revitalised by public and private partnership into a balanced sustainable development area. The Paupys area is awaiting conversion of industries according to the General plan of Vilnius - the first area to undergo this process in Vilnius, and perhaps the whole of Lithuania. While presenting a planning challenge, these areas also hold the potential to drive their revitalisation by create new ideas and methods of their implementation.