We will count chickens in the fall, but there are plenty of eggs, and, God forbid, the chicken will learn something from them. And the first chickens are already running. The School pavilion (architect Igor Chirkin) has opened in the Muzeon park, Peripter (Sergei Gikalo and Alexander Kuptsov) at the entrance to the Central House of Artists, a gazebo (Alexander Brodsky), the Garage pavilion (Artem Staborovsky, Artem Kitaev, etc.), a boat station with a cafe will open there from day to day (Alexander Tsimailo and Nikolai Lyashenko). And in the fall - another pavilion of the Garage - already designed by Shigeru Bana.
Of course, it is too early to draw conclusions: just "this summer's trend", as Elena Gonzalez wrote. But this is the rare case when European fashion does not seem like a vulgar borrowing. This architecture is surprisingly accurate to meet the demands of the time. How the early Khrushchev architecture, aptly named by the historian Andrei Kaftanov "pavilion", once lay on them - open to both world trends and its own citizens, transparent, from the most modern materials at that time. And how the wooden pavilions of the All-Union Agricultural Exhibition of 1923 became a symbol of the new constructivist architecture even earlier. Of course, the comparison is strained: then a completely new form came to architecture, which shaped the same radically new ideological meanings. The current projects clearly gravitate towards the classics: peripter, rotunda, gazebo … However, unlike the stone counterfeits for the classics that dotted Moscow under Luzhkov, these objects are devoid of pathos and ambition. Eternal classics in timeless material - much more ironic.
This "small" architecture is fundamentally different from the "big" one that we have had in the last 20 years. That one brought little joy: neither to the city, nor to the people. Except for those who have acquired expensive real estate or managed to get rich on it. And she did not express any other idea besides the idea of money. That there are many of them - in the case of the private one. Or that there are few of them - in the case of the public one. And how could she be different if she grew up on bribes and kickbacks? The architects themselves, of course, were happy about it - in comparison with the previous period, they had much more freedom. But the criticism was tormented all the time by the feeling that he had to finish the writing, to hold out … But when you turn on the Hamburg counter, it’s a disaster. Turn off the light, drain the oil.
And it’s not even a matter that that architecture - bold, developer’s - did little to meet international standards. It's just that this explanation was obvious, good, everyone drives, they see everything. But this is the same as explaining his departure from his wife by the fact that she does not look like Keira Knightley. Well, and you, my dear, Jeremy Irons, or what? Every nation has the architecture it deserves (as does the government). And our habitual complaint that Russian architecture is not like "there" is nothing more than a reflection of a deeper anguish - about a different government, a different climate, a different world.
It would seem that nothing has changed. On the contrary, everything only gets worse. But architecture is a lagging thing. Until it comes up with, until all the approvals have passed, until it is built … You look, there is a new year. And the summer boom of pavilion architecture reflected precisely this winter rally mood. When, for once, you want to be together and do something together. And the architecture you want is exactly this - not a solid house behind a high fence, not a painted shopping mall, but a Greek, damn it, amphitheater. Yes, the scale is not the same, and the rallies did not lead to a revolution, but people wanted to change something - at least within the framework of their neighborhood, yard. And these modest pavilions are quite adequate to this "courtyard urbanism", this boom of "small affairs". If the bell was not cast for us, then it is the time of the bells here. And we have pavilions.
Here, however, not everything is unambiguous either. Grigory Revzin wrote that the Park of Culture, renovated under Sergei Kapkov, was not in demand by the protesters. “When the cancer whistled, it never occurred to a single person to go to the park. And everyone went to Chistye Prudy, where they had gone before. … It turns out that the attempts to build a dialogue between the city authorities and residents, made over the past year, attempts to create public spaces - they are not to say that they have been crowned with success. On the other hand, the Park became the only place cultivated as we would like to happen - and it was quite logical not to trample on it.
However, this summer, when not only hipsters were thrown into the Park, the skepticism of professionals began to grow. Architect Yaroslav Kovalchuk went to the Park and reported: “Everything seems to be fine: volleyball, big, children walk by the fountains, but there is always a feeling that all this is not real. As if people are portraying life, not living. They even kiss somehow not for real, as if it were all a huge extras for shooting a Russian megablockbuster. " “Well, yes,” said critic Elena Gonzalez, “this is a game of well-being. But we are not laughing at a child who is portraying an adult? " Architect Kirill Ass clarified: “The park is annoying with its relaxation, because you know that the pussies are sitting, that they are being driven into occupation, and that an anti-constitutional law is being passed in the Duma. But this is not a park problem. This is the problem of its users, who go to rest when important things happen. In addition, this is a specially marked area: "here we indulge in idleness."
It’s easy, of course, to be caught in idleness when you’re sitting in the park with your laptop in your back. And if you read a good book in it? In general, in order not to indulge idleness, but at the same time to develop the garden and park economy, two competitions were held - for the project of a large book pavilion (for events) and a small one - "Gogol-module" (for the book trade). The organizers were the ARCHIWOOD project (Yulia Zinkevich), the Institute of Books (Alexander Gavrilov) and Bureau 17 (Alexandrina Markvo). The project is financed by the Moscow Department of Media and Advertising - within the framework of the “Books in Parks” program, which involves various book events in the open air.
Initially, the contests were thought of as open, but the constant change of introductory letters made us still refrain from excessive publicity. As a result, mainly young architects with experience in working with wood, who have been nominated for the ARCHIWOOD prize for the last three years, were invited to participate in them. The jury included classics (Evgeny Ass, Totan Kuzembaev, Nikolay Belousov, Nikolai Lyutomsky, Vladimir Kuzmin and Vlad Savinkin), parks directors (Elena Tyunyaeva, Ignat Zholobov), deputy head of the Mosgorpark department Fedor Novikov, representative of the Moscow Media Department Sergey Lobanov, head of Rossa Rakenne SPB (HONKA) Alexander Lvovsky, director of Lumi Alexey Dauman and organizers of the competition.
In the competition for the "Gogol-module" the task of the participants was to create such an object that a couple of days a week functions as a retail outlet, and the rest of the time turns into park furniture - a bench or a gazebo. That is, it does not clutter up the park with a dull warehouse volume, but works for the benefit of the townspeople - attracting them with the originality of the form and the comfort of their stay. And it provokes conversations with books on weekends or during book festivals. From the quote about the fact that “we need kinder generosity, and such gogols that they would not touch us,” the name was born: these “gogols” should touch us. And we are theirs. There will be several of them in each park - hence the "module". In addition, the terms of reference stipulated the need to protect the contents from precipitation - which is an eternal problem for park festivals.
And, as always, this pragmatics began to come into conflict with the task of creating a bright object. Almost the sculpture - the modernist "Nose" - was designed by Sergei Gikalo and Alexander Kuptsov. However, the jury considered that this thing would look great in the interior, but its oblique corners from slanting rain may not save it.
It is characteristic that this project ignored the task of transformability. More precisely, he solved it within the framework of a constant volume. Behind this position, you can consider a clear professional message: any transformer quickly breaks down. “But this is primarily a matter of operation,” explained architect Dmitry Bush, why sliding roofs are not made over our stadiums. "This will work in Japan, but not in Russia."
But it seemed to us that within a small object, such a request is possible. Dmitry Kondrashov answered it most interestingly, having composed the most hi-tech object: on the lower supporting tier-ellipse there is a second one, which spins like a plate (on wheels along guides), freeing up space for sitting.
But basically, the authors preferred to carry out transformability in simpler ways. This is the mobility of individual parts: retractable benches and folding tabletops by Dmitry Glushkov; the rising wings of polycarbonate from Alena Alikina and Kirill Bair; drawers that become benches - from Yulia Ionova. Rethinking the functions of components: drawers for books turn into stools (an elegant fantasy on the themes of IKEA by Daria Butakhina and Alexander Kudimov). Combining elements (as always, a radically minimalist project by Nikita Asadov).
The most extravagant turned out to be "The Wheel of History" by Esbergen Sabitov, in which books rotate like in a lottery wheel.
A touching garden image was suggested by Sophia Gaultier: an elegantly cut tree on one of the walls of her gazebo lay like a shadow on the other wall - already drawn.
Alexandra Chertkova was guided by the current trend of recycling: she collects her object from wood briquettes, tying them with a rope. And Anna Bakhlina cut out another graceful sculpture, a kind of brace-boat …
After much debate, two projects reached the final. And not even all the members of the jury immediately realized that they were made by the same team. And, as it turned out, a very young team - the RueTemple workshop. It was created by Daria Butakhina and Alexander Kudimov. The customers liked the first project for its practicality, and the jury - for its interactivity: a bookcase on one side, and on the other - a pyramid-ladder. Let it not be an amphitheater, but something on this topic - if you move it together.
But their other project won: a cylindrical pergola covered with polycarbonate, the stiffeners of which serve as bookshelves. The jury was a little embarrassed by the recollection of a similar technique (the children's store “We Play Together” by Alexei Nevzorov), but there it was interior work, and in general the history of this form is much deeper in order to worry about the secondary. Moreover, in the space of a city park, this technique sounds completely different, becoming, moreover, an excellent landmark.
The theme of the "landmark object" was powerfully sounded in the second competition, which is logical, since it, in contrast to the "Gogol-modules", had a site - an "g" -shaped junction of two alleys in the Muzeon park. This facility is to function as a book café and literary event center. The hearts of the jury members were immediately won over by Andrey Asadov's spectacular project: the facades of his pavilion are completely stitched with poetry. The strings are laser-cut into the plywood, and there is a tempting chill-out on the roof (and this is the only contestant who ventured to offer an exploited roof).
The luxurious decorativeness of this project was opposed by Nikita Asadov's version - all built on the contrast of the meager decoration with the energetic life of the object: the doors open independently of each other, each time creating a slightly different image, and the bar counter is disassembled into stools. However, the plot of 8 x 8 meters led to approximately the same volumetric solutions, tending to a cube, and the request for mobility led to constructive moves: swing doors. Similarly, Evgeny Morozov (only his lamellas are glass and only the main facade opens), Vladimir Yuzbashev (who successfully diversified the interior with a wonderful staircase) and the MEGABUDKA bureau, whose project became Evgeny Ass's favorite - as "the clearest and most believable", decided their pavilions in a similar way.
The projects of Ivan Shalmin (podium under a spectacular awning) and Ivan Pavlovsky broke out of this scheme: a brutal composition of two volumes, inside one of which a pitched roof suddenly appears.
They did not play cubes, but, on the contrary, played out the horizontal line inherent in the park, two other projects. Yaroslav Kovalchuk also played in nostalgia, proportioning his pavilion close to the kiosks dear to the heart of the Soviet people. Foam concrete blocks and glazed counters support the elegiac theme.
A no less clean and laconic solution was proposed by Sergei Gikalo and Alexander Kuptsov: the frame defines the image of the pavilion, and the unevenly pitched roof catches the difference in the status of the two alleys. It was, perhaps, the most "park" project and the most accurately inscribed in the place.
A lot of sympathy was won by the project of Alexander Kudimov, who in this competition performed already under the flag of Totan Kuzembaev's Workshop. Maximum functional flexibility is achieved here with minimal means. All walls of the pavilion are made of plywood box modules (40 x 40 x 40 cm), which are connected by metal channels. Each box serves as a bookshelf, but when removed from the wall, it can also become a stool. The same boxes make up the bar counter and the stage, which is mounted in the corner of the pavilion in the evenings (the corner has been carefully cut out for the passage of those who float in the daytime). Finally, they also form two walls, which are built on two sides of the pavilion, expanding and at the same time comfortably organizing the space during events … But it is precisely this transformability that creates the main vulnerability of the project: becoming stools (or a stage), the cubes inevitably deform, get dirty and work worse and worse like a wall.
Nevertheless, the architects - members of the jury believed in the viability of this project (“cleanliness is a matter of exploitation!”) And voted for it. But the majority of the jury preferred the catchy recognition of the object of Andrey Asadov, who became the winner.
