Art residences in Nikola-Lenivets have been lacking for a very long time - the village, which became widely known thanks to the work of Nikolai Polissky and the holding of the Archstoyanie festival, is now physically unable to accommodate everyone, while the stream of both artists and tourists who would like to linger, it only grows every year. That is why in June the autonomous non-profit organization ArchPolis Support Center for Architects, Designers, Artists and Representatives of the Performing Arts announced an open competition for a project to create a new settlement. First, the qualifying selection of the teams of participants was carried out, then, within the framework of Archstoyanie, an exhibition of the portfolio of 15 winners of this stage was held, and in mid-July the teams began to develop the concept itself. The settlement of artists is supposed to be located between the villages of Nikola-Lenivets, Koltsovo and Zvizzhi - the terms of reference of the competition ordered to locate three residential complexes, a children's institution, an exhibition pavilion, ten family and twenty private residences on an area of about 140 hectares.
Creative association "Shishka", which included Sander Lap ((LAP landscape and Urban design), Juan Tur (MADHOC Arquitectura + Paisaje), Askar Ramazanov, Aldo Trim (Plane Sight Architecture), Maria Kachalova (Rhizome group) and Anton Ivanov, suggested not to create a new town between the villages, but, on the contrary, to preserve the original structure of small settlements. The center of the whole composition is the so-called field of stars - a new site for holding summer festivals. Along the perimeter of the field, the team placed three communities - "Farm", " Field "," Forest ", and each of them has another smaller field and it is around it that separate structures are organized - creative workshops and public buildings. According to the architects, these inner circles of buildings will be more than enough for winter events, while in summer, during the largest events, communities will be used to the maximum.
The objects are supposed to be connected with boardwalks, and the settlements, in turn, will be connected by power grids and roads - this is the "Constellation", from the large "stars" of which the rays of the roads stretch to the "luminaries" of smaller ones - ten comfortable eco-villas. And if the exhibition pavilions and workshops are interpreted as extremely traditional and laconic wooden houses with gable roofs (the authors have developed a whole catalog of conceptual proposals on this topic), then the architectural solution of the villas can be anything - its architects deliberately leave it at the mercy of the owners themselves, realizing that among the latter will be dominated by artists and designers.
The jury recognized the Team Shishka concept as the most successful and fully meeting the requirements of the competition task. As for the greatest advantage of the project of the Russian-Dutch architectural alliance, experts called the ability of "Constellation" to integrate seamlessly and imperceptibly into the existing landscape as much as possible. It is also important that the project provides for the start of construction of art residences is planned for next year.
