Reconstruction of the territory of the Krasnaya Roza factory is one of the earliest and most famous projects of this kind in Moscow. We can say that this project, which started back in the late 1990s, is one of those that stand at the origins of the increasingly powerful fashion for converting industrial zones into modern office (less often residential) spaces. In 2003-2004, Sergei Kiselev & Partners developed an urban planning concept for the reconstruction of the Krasnaya Roza territory, and then designed two of the most impressive A-class office buildings for this territory. We have recently talked about one of them, “Shed” building No. 1. The second, at number 8, is located in the opposite, southeastern, part of the territory.
Building 8, the construction of which began in spring 2007, is a large square with a courtyard. This building, the largest in the quarter (total area of more than 61 thousand square meters), will unite several facades restored according to drawings, one old building and modern glass of the main volume.
The preserved building adjoins the building from the side and faces Timur Frunze Street with its main facade. It, according to the architects, cost the customers the most - a small costly diamond among the "useful areas". Probably, it will be sold at a higher price, as an exclusive - as a whole, for one large representative office. True, only three facade walls will remain, but they will not be concrete, but real, made of old bricks. In order for the walls not to fall, it was necessary to strengthen the foundations, which was especially expensive.
Three facades are built along the opposite Lev Tolstoy Street, subject to dismantling with subsequent reconstruction according to measurements (they fall into the "sphere of influence" of the monument - the writer's estate museum). It is a long brick building and two small houses covered with yellowish plaster. For the recreated cladding, it is planned to use German hand-molded brick, reminiscent of the material of the 19th century. In the lower part of the red facade, instead of the former windows, an open gallery will be arranged, increasing the sidewalk with its help.
I would like to call the third facade of the building a side street: a passage will appear along it, which did not exist in factory times. In the northern part, this facade begins with a preserved brick building, in the southern part it ends with a reconstructed stucco building. Between them is the visibly embodied interaction of two principles of modern architecture: technological structural glass and contextual searches, which are more than justified and inevitable here due to the presence of a historical "frame" on both sides. Architectural forms here add up to the semblance of abstract sculpture - this is downright battle painting depicting how "historicism" and "modernism" are fighting among themselves. The "old" houses flanking the composition send into the middle part of their "emissaries" - red-brick plates, which come into battle with a large glass volume rising higher, with a slight indent from the line of the new lane. The "front line" breaks, bends, and in the middle it breaks with a wide archway, the planes of the red brick are in places covered with protruding glass bay windows - representatives of the "enemy", but they do not give up positions - it seems that in response to this, asymmetric "breakthroughs" appear in the modernist planes - in-depth loggias. Everything is dynamic, stepwise, and will be made of expensive structural glass, which allows you to create large and solid stained glass planes.
The "dynamic potential" felt from the side of the lane has a slightly different effect on the courtyard. Its large square space looks like a camp of the forces of modernism, surrounded by restorations and renovations, located along the perimeter of the building. Here, in the courtyard, there is a lot of glass in giant concrete frames, bindings of various shapes, asymmetrical inserts. The volumes of the stairwells, close to the three main facades of the courtyard square, are deployed 20 degrees relative to the wall planes; on the fourth wall, this movement is supported by a similar protrusion of the large hall - thus, the space of the courtyard ceases to be uniquely square, but turns clockwise. And if you look at the plan of the building, it becomes obvious that the contour of the courtyard space is made up of two squares, turned at an angle and superimposed on each other - one obeys the main volumes and walls, and the other - the stairs.
