The Communist Party took full power in February 1948. Workshops, shops, printing and cellars passed to the state, and through the 1950s the fields and vineyards around Skalica were pushed into a JRD — a jednotné roľnícke družstvo, one collective farm per village, joined under heavy pressure. Factories and blocks of flats went up on the edge of town, and that is where the growth went. In the territorial reform of 1960 Skalica lost its district and was administered from Senica — a small humiliation for a town that had once answered only to the king. One thing it did not lose was its centre: unlike many Slovak towns it was never cleared and rebuilt, so the square, the churches and the walls came through.Vo februári 1948 prevzala komunistická strana všetku moc. Dielne, obchody, tlačiarne aj pivnice prešli na štát a v päťdesiatych rokoch polia a vinohrady okolo Skalice zahnali do JRD — jednotného roľníckeho družstva, jedného na obec, do ktorého sa vstupovalo pod tvrdým nátlakom. Na okraji mesta vyrástli závody a panelové domy a práve tam sa presunul rast. Pri územnej reforme v roku 1960 Skalica prišla o okres a spravovali ju zo Senice — malé poníženie pre mesto, ktoré sa kedysi zodpovedalo iba kráľovi. O čo neprišla, bolo jej centrum: na rozdiel od mnohých slovenských miest ho nikto neasanoval, a tak námestie, kostoly aj hradby prežili.
