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{{short description|Structure built solely to deceive others into thinking that a situation is better than it really is}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2015}}
[[File:Castle and brewery in Kolín 2.jpg|thumb|Because of a newly painted [[façade]], the whole building looks as if it has been reconstructed, although the rest is still in decay (castle brewery in [[Kolín]], [[Czech Republic]]).]]
In politics and economics, a '''Potemkin village''' ({{lang-ru|link=no|потёмкинские деревни|translit=potyomkinskiye derevni|}}) is a construction (literal or figurative) whose purpose is to provide an external façade to a situation, to make people believe that the situation is better than it is. The term comes from stories of a fake portable village built by [[Grigory Potemkin]], a [[field marshal]] and former lover of [[Empress Catherine II]], solely to impress the Empress during [[Crimean journey of Catherine the Great|her journey to Crimea in 1787]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=Grigory Potemkin {{!}} Biography, Villages, & Facts {{!}} Britannica|url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Grigory-Potemkin|access-date=2021-12-22|website=www.britannica.com|language=en}}</ref> Modern historians agree that accounts of this portable village are exaggerated. The original story was that Potemkin erected phony portable settlements along the banks of the [[Dnieper|Dnieper River]] in order to impress the Russian Empress and foreign guests. The structures would be disassembled after she passed, and re-assembled farther along her route to be seen again.
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In the [[Old West]] of the United States, [[Western false front architecture]] was often used to create the illusion of affluence and stability in a new frontier town. The style included a tall vertical façade with a square top in front of a wood-framed building, often hiding a gable roof. The goal for the architecture was to project an image of stability and success for the town, while the business owners did not invest much in buildings that might be temporary. These towns often did not last long before becoming [[ghost town]]s, so businessmen wanted to get started quickly but did not want to spend a lot on their stores. Many [[Western movies]] feature this kind of architecture because, just like the original buildings, it is quick and cheap to create.
As told in his book, [[The Gulag Archipelago]], [[Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn|Solzhenitsyn]] declined to visit the Kriukovo [[Gulag]] with a Soviet official, seemingly chosen by the Soviets well in advance of their meeting, as Solzhenitsyn assumed it would be a "Potemkin structure."
Many of the newly constructed base areas at ski resorts are referred to as Potemkin villages.<ref>{{Cite book | first=Hal | last=Clifford | year=2002 | title=Downhill Slide: Why the Corporate Ski Industry is Bad for Skiing, Ski Towns, and the Environment | publisher=Sierra Club Books | pages=[https://archive.org/details/downhillslidewhy00clif/page/106 106–110] | isbn=9781578050710 | url-access=registration | url=https://archive.org/details/downhillslidewhy00clif/page/106 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.skibum.net/rocky-mountains/colorado-ski-areas/|title=Colorado Ski Areas – SKI BUM|access-date=22 March 2017}}</ref> These create the illusion of a quaint mountain town, but are actually carefully planned theme shopping centers, hotels and restaurants designed for maximum revenue. Similarly, in ''The Geography of Nowhere'', American writer [[James Howard Kunstler]] refers to contemporary suburban shopping centers as "Potemkin village shopping plazas".<ref>Kunstler, James Howard (1993). ''The Geography of Nowhere: The Rise and Decline of America's Man-Made Landscape''. New York, Touchstone.</ref>
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* [[Disneyfication]]
* [[Potemkin Island]]
* [[Potemkin City Limits]], an album by punk band [[Propagandhi]]
* ''[[The Truman Show]]''
* [[Legends of Catherine the Great]]
* [[Novorossiya]] ("New Russia"), historical region in the [[Russian Empire]]
* [[Folly]], architecture vernacular
* [[Fake building]]
* [[Façadism]]
* [[Sportswashing]]
* [[Kijong-dong]]
* [[Portmeirion]] , a 1967 TV series '[[The Prisoner]]' set in a forcible enclosed community, a prison without physical walls.
== References ==
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