The plot on Novoalekseevskaya Street seems to have been invented for Sergei Skuratov from the very beginning. Located at the crossroads where Novoalekseevskaya, Malomoskovskaya and Pavel Korchagin streets converge, it has the shape of a complex polygon inscribed in the variegated existing buildings. The latter would not be worth a detailed description if it were not for two historical buildings - the orphanage named after the Bakhrushin brothers and the Alekseevskaya pumping station. Both of these objects were built of red brick, perfectly preserved and not only noticeably stand out against the background of the faceless late Soviet region, but serve as almost its only decoration. The complex that is supposed to be built between them just asks for the role of some kind of semantic and material bridge - and who better than Sergei Skuratov with his indomitable passion for bricks could solve this problem?
Having made, as they say, “on the shore” the choice in favor of bricks, the architect made two more fundamental decisions before starting the detailed development of the project. First, the southeastern border of the site was straightened at the junction with the historically formed industrial zone, which turned the site into a more convenient triangle for understanding. Secondly, Skuratov staked on the design of a high-rise dominant, which is extremely relevant for this place. The fact is that on the opposite side of the street there is a high modernist building of the Glavtransproekt, across the alley there is a typical residential tower, and the intersection itself is noticeably "sagging". The architect wanted to maintain the "pulse" of the panorama and at the same time not to pile up the verticals closely, so he found an unmistakable combination - Skuratov places new houses on those two sides of the triangle that are farther from the residential tower. The projected towers are also turned away from the high-rise of Glavtransproekt - the verticals, thus, although they overlap, do not enter into a direct dialogue: the architect could not ignore the high-rise at all, but he also did not want to take a rather ordinary and typical building for its time as a landmark.
Compositionally, the complex consists of two buildings located on a single two-level stylobate. The volumes have the same width, but they are radically different from each other in length and height. Building "A" has 15 residential floors and two floors of public premises, building "B" is almost two times lower: it has only 8 residential floors and two public ones, and at the same time it is much longer. In other words, Sergei Skuratov again returns to his favorite combination "tower - plate", well known from "House on Mosfilmovskaya" and, for example,
project for Rostov-on-Don. True, if there a skyscraper and a parallelepiped enter into active interaction with each other, then on Novoalekseevskaya the buildings are located strictly parallel to each other and react, rather, to collisions of the surrounding space than to each other.
So, for example, from the side of the intersection, the residential complex looks like two narrow towers located on a single base and having almost identical facades, the design of which consists of alternating high narrow windows and the same deaf, depressed cells. And if earlier the skyscraper of Glavtransproyekt dominated the intersection of several streets, albeit slightly from the side, sewn from top to bottom with the same vertical stitches of windows, now two new volumes with also modernist, but much more subtly and variedly elaborated facades seem to force it to retreat. This urban planning situation can be compared to a scene on which a soffit beam wanders - until recently it snatched out only emptiness from the darkness, but now the focus is on two textured verticals that are very juicy, thanks to the chosen material.
It is interesting that the towers are not located on one straight line: Skuratov pushes the higher volume closer to the intersection, forcing him to actively respond to the traffic situation. This tower is vertically cut into two almost equal halves - the upper floors are separated from the lower ones by a transparent belt - and it turns its "head" to the right, in plan following the tracing of the 1st Rizhsky lane, which is the closest to the site. The second volume also does not remain indifferent, but its plastic is no longer so active: on the facade facing the intersection you can see a characteristic "dent", but on the cast brick plane it is not so striking. “We treated these two volumes as a stable pair,” Sergey Skuratov explains his idea. - The first, higher volume is pushed forward - he is the undoubted leader, dynamic and emotional. Its shape almost attacks and reacts actively to collisions of the surrounding space. The other, lower and more oblong, is solved more calmly and more restrained. Collisions penetrate into it, but they, unlike the first volume, rather deform its structure than provoke activity."
The stylobate, which occupies almost the entire area of the site, is predictably used by Sergey Skuratov to organize the courtyard. However, the architect deliberately avoids the stereotypical solution in the form of a green operated roof, believing that in a megalopolis it is not able to provide residents with the proper level of comfort and security, and deepens the courtyard by more than three meters, fencing it around the perimeter with a brick wall. Due to the variable height and the presence of through openings, the latter does not give the impression of a fortress, but clearly zones the space of the courtyard, separating it from both the city park and the entrance to the underground parking. In an effort to diversify the look of the courtyard as much as possible, Skuratov saturates it with a variety of functions - there are lawns, a playground with a rotunda and a green hill, and a canopy bridge connecting the two buildings and providing comfortable access to the entrance lobbies from cars in the rain. By the way, about the lobbies: by deepening the courtyard, the architect was able to design from its side double-height entrance spaces with a height of as much as 8.4 meters. Colossal lobbies have fully glazed walls, so that the line between outside and inside is practically erased, and the feeling of a skillfully designed environment in which modern architecture organically blends with nature, on the contrary, becomes dominant.
According to Skuratov himself, when designing a residential complex on Novoalekseevskaya Street, he tried to take into account all the usual shortcomings of elite housing in the city center - there is a larger yard, and the lobbies are larger and lighter, there are enough parking lots and rooms for storing personal belongings. The architect compensated for the remoteness from the center with the convenience of layouts and the expressive appearance of the buildings, the brick facades of which link the new volumes with the immediate surroundings. Mathematically verified strict facades, and even if not solid, nevertheless, the fence suggests that Skuratov has got another fort that reliably protects its residents from the bustle of the metropolis. Yes, this fortress is located far from the center, but it is close to the metro, the Third Transport Ring and Sokolniki Park - and on the scale of the expanded Moscow, this is perhaps an even more profitable and convenient offer.
