The fact that the exposition of the festival this year presented an unusually large number of works was felt literally from the very first steps. The conference hall, which usually hosts competitive projects, this time literally burst with stands: if before, it happened, you stopped at the threshold and you could look around the entire exhibition, now from the door you could only see labyrinthine passages between numerous photographs and visualizations. However, this is not all: a similarly dense hanging reigned in the corridor leading to the hall of the general plan of Moscow, and from there special signs suggested climbing to the mezzanine floor. At the latter, however, instead of the promised continuation of the competition, a personal exposition of the architectural and design company Architecton was discovered, which decided to exhibit a dozen projects at once and therefore did not fit in the main hall, but this does not change the overall impression of the show: the private sector has fully recovered from the consequences of the economic crisis and is developing more actively than ever.
This development, judging by the exposition, goes in several directions at once. On the one hand, palace interiors and large-scale country estates are still in price and respect, on the other, modern architecture has definitely taken its own niche in the market. Clean, laconic forms, discreet eco-friendly materials, moderately large-scale glazing and friendly interaction with the surrounding nature - all this can be found not only in Pirogovo and even, fortunately, not only in the Moscow region. And although it is often very difficult to get rid of the thought that all these cottages were designed by the direct heirs of Frank Lloyd Wright or, say, imitators of Vladimir Plotkin (who this year, by the way, was a member of the jury of the festival competition), the very fact of widespread demand for such architecture cannot not to please.
On the other hand, it is clear how difficult the situation is this year for the members of the jury: good taste prevented them from choosing winners among luxury-style masters, and in order to find a truly original project among high-quality, but subtly similar examples of minimalist architecture, I had to try pretty hard. That is why, by the way, the Grand Prix of the festival was again not awarded - there really was no clear leader among 170 projects.
In the category “Realized Country House”, the first place was awarded to a private house in the village of Klyushnikovo (“Architectural Bureau 610”). The volume is only 60 sq.m. completely made of wood and is a complex puzzle of open terraces and living quarters flowing into each other. The console of the second floor with a wide square window looks especially impressive, which can be accessed both by an internal staircase and from the upper terrace.
Another newcomer of the competition, which immediately became its laureate, is "Architectural Bureau 11", which received the first prize in the nomination "Project-Idea of a Country House". Their house is 390 sq.m. It is also conceived entirely of wood, and its name, which reflects the essence of the planning concept, perfectly echoes the name of the festival itself. “Under one roof” is a house, divided into three functionally different parts, which are interconnected not only by passages and terraces, but also by the roof, in some places effectively discharged to the pergola. Thanks to the latest technique, the architects managed to arrange the patio and pool area in the open air and at the same time make them part of the total volume.
The best cottage community was named "Village in Bullfinches", designed by the architectural studio of Alexei Kozyr. The settlement consists of only 8 houses, strung on both sides on the axis of the central street and separated from each other only by the plots themselves. However, the democracy of this settlement is given not only by the absence of a lattice of fences, but also by the very layout of the houses - each of them is a cube from which the architects take out certain fragments, depending on the real needs of the customer. The closest competitor of Aleksey Kozyr in this nomination (I must say, in principle, very few - only 11 projects participated in the competition) was Mikhail Khazanov with the Gorki-11 cottage community. This is not the first time the project, exhibited at the House on Brestskaya, was awarded a silver medal.
In the Public Interior nomination, the first place was awarded to the office of the Aeroexpress company (the Arch Group architectural bureau). The architects Alexei Goryainov and Mikhail Krymov undoubtedly managed to convey in the interior the specifics of the company, which ensures the fastest transportation of passengers from the airport to the city center and back. So, the heart of the office is a single control center fenced off by a curved glass wall and is likened to an airplane turbine, while the design of other zones is dominated by scarlet stripes reminiscent of fast-moving aeroexpress trains, and thin tubes of ceiling lamps, evoking associations either with rails or with the same express trains. racing through the night
Alas, no equally clear leader in the Residential Interior nomination was found - the jury did not award the first place, the second place was shared by Pyotr Kostelov for the project of a multi-level apartment in Moscow and the ub design studio for the interior of an apartment in Zhukovka. But in the nomination "Decoration" the winner was the architect Sergei Erofeev, whose apartment in the historical center of St. Petersburg won the jury both with the general interior design and the thoughtful combination of many small decorative elements.
And finally, in the category "Detail" won
private dwelling house in the Sokol village, designed by Vladislav Platonov (ASB Karlson and K). The author himself calls this mansion, endowed with a memorable silhouette and striking appearance, "Yin-Yang", and, indeed, it has enough interesting architectural and design finds. However, the victory of this house at the festival proves not only the fairness of the judging of its jury, but also the fact that there is no statute of limitations for truly interesting projects - realized about eight years ago, it has only now received public and professional recognition.
