Archi.ru: Valery Vasilyevich, how often does your workshop deal with working documentation?
Valery Lukomsky: We bring almost every project to its logical conclusion, going through all the stages from idea to implementation. Thanks to our strong staff (and about 90 specialists - architects, designers, engineers - work in the City-Arch workshop on a permanent basis), we have all the possibilities for this. In total, during the existence of the company, about 200 objects have been designed, of which 87 are at the stage of "Working design" with their subsequent implementation. As a company open for cooperation, we are always ready to take part in joint projects of interest to us. Among such works - the Club of Foreign Intelligence Veterans on Khodynskoye Pole, where we worked together with colleagues from Mosproekt-4, (we did working documentation) a multifunctional business center on Novoryazanskaya Street together with OOO Architectural Workshop Sergey Kiselev and Partners and a shopping center in Zhukovsky, where the authors were colleagues from Grazhdanproekt.
Archi.ru: How is working on working documentation for someone else's project different from working on your own project?
VL: In principle, there is no such thing as “someone else's project”. When you work on a project, no matter at what stage, it still becomes familiar and yours. It is another matter whether you are the author yourself or continue the author's intention. In the latter case, first of all, it is necessary to thoroughly delve into all the nuances of the author's intention. We have long ago formulated for ourselves the basic rule of working with RD - to bring the project to implementation, keeping the idea conceived by the author. Therefore, throughout the entire work, we work closely with the team of authors, inform the authors of what we are doing at the moment, and coordinate the necessary changes with them. There are no exceptions. Moreover, in the case of the project of the Club of Foreign Intelligence Veterans, we were included in the team of authors based on the results of the work, since we were able to convince the customer of the need to develop a new solution for the facades.
Archi.ru: Do you mean that mottled black and white cladding of the building that masks the window system?
V. L.: Yes, exactly her. Initially, the facades were supposed to be made more uniform in color, light gray, but from the very first acquaintance with the object we were convinced that it deserves a brighter palette. Its location itself obliges this - the building “holds” the entire site, so we did not spare our efforts on interaction with the authors of the project and explanatory work with the customer. When the new palette of facades and their materials (stemalite plus glass) had already been determined, together with Andrey Bokov and Vadim Lenk, we went to the site four times, hung samples and selected the desired shade.
Archi.ru: And yet the example you gave seems to me rather an exception to the rule … It is no secret that more often an architectural project in the process of implementation, if it changes, then in the direction of simplification and cost reduction.
V. L.: In this sense, the assignment of the development of the RD to another bureau for the project may be even more profitable. At least, when a customer asks me to simplify or change something in the project, I just throw up my hands: "This is not my project, I cannot change anything in it, please communicate with the authors."And then, together with the authors, we fight off such "rationalization proposals", defending the original ideas. This, for example, was the case with the business center on Novoryazanskaya Street: the customer tried to replace the brick with cheaper brick-like panels, but we were able to defend the original material.
Archi.ru: Probably, it also happens the other way around, when a project has to be redone due to the fact that fire safety and other norms have changed?
V. L.: Yes, we also face this problem. Norms do not change very often, but it is sometimes very difficult to take them into account at the “idea” stage. So to bring the project to the "norm" is our task. But the ideas of the customer change often and sometimes radically. In the Foreign Intelligence Veterans' Club, for example, we had to redesign almost the entire "internal" due to the fact that the customer's assignment for the layout of the internal premises had changed. And in the business center on Novoryazanskaya, indeed, norms intervened - the project was developed in 2003, and since then the requirements for fire safety and the number of parking spaces have changed. But, I confess, the main problem here is economic - as a rule, the cost of the object has already been agreed with the customer, and it can be very difficult to fit all these project alterations into the allocated budget. In addition, the project, most likely, has already passed the examination, which means that all changes must be coordinated with a new one.
Archi.ru: In fact, this time simply drops out of the bureau's creative life?
V. L.: For any architect, creativity, of course, comes first. However, there are everyday life, and work at the stage of "working documentation" is a good school. In the process of developing an RD and subsequent supervision, we get a unique opportunity to track many technical and engineering aspects of the implementation of an architectural project. The same capacities of air conditioners and ventilation, for example, which are often included in the project on the basis of approximate calculations - we “test” all the indicators in practice and then only include verified data in our projects. This is a great chance to hone your professionalism. Without changing the author's idea, we will develop every detail of the project and we will know for sure that thanks to our painstaking and high-quality work, the object took place.
