At the beginning of 1861, priest Luka Đurović came to Drobnjak from Bjelopavlići. At the urging of his uncle, and together with Rade Šujov Karadžić, he repaired the mill in Petnjica and opened a tavern and a shop there. That same year, priest Luka also built a house at the very confluence of the Šavnik and Bukovica rivers. The house was a simple, single-story stone structure, roofed with straw and brushwood. Shortly afterwards, a house was built by Đoko Radulović, a gunsmith (tufegdžija) from the Lješanska nahija, and later by Risto Ivanović, a blacksmith from Pljevlja. Thus, the first three houses built in Šavnik were: a tavern with a shop, a gunsmith’s workshop, and a blacksmith’s forge. The first private residential house in Šavnik was built by Tripko Tomić from Previš, followed soon after by the Pekić family.
This was how the town came into being, taking its name from šavice—willow twigs used as roofing material. Šavnik soon developed into the economic, trade, and political center of the Drobnjak tribe. After the unification of 1918, Šavnik became the administrative center of the entire Durmitor region. From its earliest days, the town showed a notable awareness of urban planning. Thanks to brides who came from Risan—and who influenced their husbands in the construction of houses, often bringing along their brothers and relatives as builders, since there were no skilled masons in Drobnjak—Šavnik acquired, to a great extent, the appearance of a coastal settlement.