The slow living movement, as it is marketed in lifestyle media, tends to involve a particular set of props: linen tablecloths, sourdough bread, a carefully curated bookshelf, perhaps a cottage somewhere with good light. It is a real thing — a genuine reaction against the pace and noise of modern life — but the packaging can make it feel like another form of consumption dressed up as its opposite.
What I find interesting about living in the Czech Republic is that many of the habits associated with slow living are not aspirational here. They are just how things are done. Not everywhere, not by everyone, but enough to notice — and enough to learn from, if you are paying attention.
The Czech relationship with food
Food is probably the clearest example. Czech cooking is not fast food culture — it is a tradition of long-cooked dishes, preserved vegetables, and meals that take time to prepare and are meant to be eaten without rushing. Svíčková, guláš, bramboráky — these are not dishes you make in fifteen minutes. They require attention and patience, and the result is food that actually tastes like something.
The habit of cooking at home, rather than ordering in or eating out by default, is still more common here than in many Western European cities. This is partly economic — eating out in Prague has become expensive relative to cooking at home — but it is also cultural. The kitchen is still a place where things happen, not just a room you pass through.
The seasonal dimension of Czech food culture is also worth noting. Mushroom picking in autumn is not a niche hobby here — it is something a significant portion of the population does, including people who live in cities and drive out to the forests on weekends. The same goes for berry picking, fruit preserving, and growing vegetables in allotment gardens (zahrádkářské kolonie), which are a common feature of Czech cities.
The pace of Czech towns
Prague has become a genuinely busy city, and in the centre it can feel as rushed as anywhere in Europe. But step outside the tourist areas, or visit one of the smaller Czech towns — Telč, Třeboň, Kroměříž — and the pace is different. Not slower in a passive sense, but more deliberate. People sit in cafes for longer. Shops close at reasonable hours. There is a sense that the day has a shape, and that shape includes time that is not scheduled.
There is a sense that the day has a shape — and that shape includes time that is not scheduled.
This is not nostalgia. It is a different relationship with time, one that does not treat every unscheduled hour as a problem to be solved. The Czech concept of pohoda — roughly translated as ease, comfort, a relaxed good mood — captures something of this. It is not laziness. It is the deliberate cultivation of conditions in which life feels manageable rather than overwhelming.
Walking as a default
Czech cities, particularly Prague, are well-suited to walking. The historic centre is compact, the neighbourhoods are distinct enough to be interesting, and the public transport network means that a car is genuinely optional for most daily tasks. Many people walk as a matter of course — not as exercise, not as a mindfulness practice, but simply as the most sensible way to get from one place to another.
Walking changes your relationship with a city. You notice things you miss from a tram or a car. You develop a sense of the city's geography and texture that you cannot get from a map. You arrive at places slightly differently than you left them, because the journey itself has done something.
The Vltava riverbank in Prague is one of the better urban walking routes in Central Europe — long enough to clear your head, varied enough to stay interesting, and connected enough to the rest of the city that it is easy to incorporate into an ordinary day rather than treating it as a special occasion.
The culture of the hospoda
The Czech pub — the hospoda — is a social institution that does not translate easily into other contexts. It is not a bar in the British sense, not a café in the French sense, and not a restaurant in the American sense. It is a place where people sit for a long time, drink beer at a reasonable pace, and talk. The conversation is the point, not the drinks.
What is interesting about the hospoda from a slow living perspective is that it provides a socially sanctioned space for doing nothing productive. You are not there to network, to be seen, or to accomplish anything. You are there to be with other people in an unhurried way. This is rarer than it sounds in contemporary urban life, where most social spaces are oriented around consumption or activity.
The neighbourhood hospoda — as opposed to the tourist-facing beer halls in the centre — tends to be quieter, cheaper, and more genuinely social. Finding one worth returning to is one of the better things you can do when settling into a new part of Prague.
Nature as a regular part of life
The Czech Republic is a small country with a high proportion of forest cover — roughly one third of the total land area. For most Czech people, access to forests, rivers, and countryside is not a luxury or a special trip. It is a regular part of life, particularly on weekends.
The tradition of chalupaření — owning or renting a cottage in the countryside and spending weekends there — is deeply embedded in Czech culture. It is not about luxury or status. It is about having a place where the pace is different, where there is a garden to tend, where the connection to seasons and weather is more immediate than it is in the city.
You do not need a chalupa to access this. The train network connects Prague to countryside within an hour in most directions. The hiking trail network (značené turistické trasy) covers the country comprehensively and is well-maintained. A day in the Bohemian Switzerland national park, the Šumava forests, or the Moravian Karst is achievable from Prague or Brno without a car and without much planning.
What city dwellers can take from this
The slow living habits that are most embedded in Czech culture are not complicated. They are mostly about time — taking it, rather than trying to save it. Cooking a meal that takes an hour. Walking somewhere instead of taking a taxi. Sitting in a pub for two hours without checking your phone. Spending a weekend in the forest without a particular agenda.
None of this requires a lifestyle overhaul or a particular philosophy. It requires only the decision, repeated often enough to become habitual, to let some things take the time they actually take.
That is, in the end, what slow living means in Bohemia. Not a movement, not an aesthetic, not a set of purchases. Just the ordinary practice of being somewhere, doing something, without rushing towards the next thing.