"Our house"
The long-standing conflict around the house of Konstantin Melnikov on August 13 again entered an acute phase. On this day, the Museum of Architecture. A. V. Shchusev circulated a press release stating that “the staff of the State Museum of Konstantin and Viktor Melnikovs have begun work to recreate the memorial setting of the Melnikov House”; the curator of the museum will be the granddaughter of the architect Elena Melnikova. On the same day, it became known that the husband of Ekaterina Karinskaya, another granddaughter of Konstantin Melnikov, who had lived with her family in the famous house for more than ten years, returning from the hospital, found the locks broken, the doors closed, and the house was inhabited by private security companies. Karinskaya, hastily returned to Moscow with her family, barely entered the house, at the moment she is in the house, but cannot leave.
The press and the public are divided: some say that Yekaterina Karinskaya “barricaded herself in the house” and does not allow starting an inventory of property to create a museum, others report a raider seizure of Melnikov's house. “Nothing good will come of even good intentions if the tools are immoral and illegal,” writes the avant-garde historian and recent director of the center at the Jewish Museum Alexander Selivanov on Facebook. "DOMNASH!" - as always, subtly ironic Evgeniy Ass comments on the situation.
“When our employees went inside, they were shocked by how much was lost and disturbed. There are a lot of unnecessary things in the House that have nothing to do with the memorial setting,”meanwhile, Deputy Director of the Museum of Architecture Pavel Kuznetsov told Moskovsky Komsomolets in words, also tell RIA Novosti, Moscow 24, TVC and Izvestia).
Press / new about the Kremlin
Konstantin Mikhailov from Ogonyok believes that there is absolutely no need to look for the reasons why it was decided to restore the Chudov and the Resurrection Monasteries - the circumstances will be forgotten, and the result, which "even the most notorious Moscow ethnographers have dreamed of out loud for more than eight decades," will remain. A public space will appear in place of the regime building, the Kremlin will no longer be thought of as a separate “castle”, “treasuries” of historical memories will open - these steps should be appreciated. The author of the article in Moscow Perspective argues in about the same vein, and also hopes that the Kremlin will serve as an example to other federal institutions that like to enclose their territories with barriers and fences.
Kommersant also recalled ten more architectural relics that could be revived in the Kremlin, and Rossiyskaya Gazeta spoke with the commandant Sergei Khlebnikov.
RIA Novosti reports that design and survey work is underway to reconstruct the Kremlin walls. In the near future, the western part of the wall will be put in order - from the Spasskaya to the Troitskaya tower, it will become a pedestrian one and will open up beautiful city panoramas.
Moscow suburbs
Podmoskovye 360 publishes an interview with the head of the Megan bureau Yuri Grigoryan about the historical cities of the Moscow region. According to the architect, this is a unique asset of the region that can and should be developed while preserving its uniqueness. It is only necessary to create, or rather even catalyze, interest in historical cities at all levels, as well as develop a taste for a beautiful life in a historical environment. Together with KB Strelka, Grigoryan is developing a methodology for creating the architectural appearance of the historical cities of the Moscow region, which will be tested in Zaraysk and Zvenigorod.
Afisha-Gorod spoke with the new adviser to the governor of the Moscow region, Igor Chaika, who heads the group to create Albums of a New Look for Moscow Region cities - step-by-step improvement plans. They describe all the transformations - from paving slabs to the brand of the city, the reorganization of transport hubs, the reconstruction of architectural monuments and the organization of parks and walking areas. An entire section is dedicated to urban spaces for youth and the standardization of urban façade signage. According to Chaika, advanced foreign experience is used in the work.
The first album, developed for Wedge, received mixed reviews, which are quoted by IA REGNUM. Ekaterina Titova, an architect and member of the Moscow Region VOOPIIiK, believes that everything was done too quickly, beautiful and attractive pictures for non-specialists have turned out that have little to do with reality. There is no functional zoning scheme, no practical solutions for the organization of space and the development of cultural heritage, there are only general proposals - to shift the center, expand the living areas.
At the same time, Vasily Soshnikov, a consultant to the Moscow Architectural Council, expresses the opinion that “the ideas of the concept of the“New Look of Moscow Region Cities”will allow not only rebranding them and increasing their attractiveness for tourists, but, first of all, should radically improve the quality of life of entire groups of the Moscow population. area.
You can view the album for Wedge here.
Foreign experience
A recipe for improving the urban periphery is offered on the pages of the UrbanUrban portal by a student of the London School of Economics Andrei Perminov. He participated in the study of the Tuls Hill area and as a result formulated the following scheme: to bring the area out of "oblivion" through publications in the press and competently built communication; create centers of attraction; to attract active young people to participate in the life of the district; strengthen economic partnerships with neighboring areas; cultivate identity by all means. Leitmotif: "people are one of the most important assets of any territory."
The Theories and Practices published reflections of Richard Castelli, chief curator of Archstoyania-2014, on the role of time in architecture. He told how to use time as a means of artistic expression, how not to lose the charm of the era during restoration, and why it is useful for an architect to imagine what the ruins of the projected building will look like.
The Kultura TV channel has prepared a short report on the lecture of the Brazilian Guto Requen at the Strelka Institute: a story about how to create material objects from emotions, poetry and memories using digital and hybrid technologies.
Blogs
On Facebook pages there is a discussion of "Albums of a new look" and activities of Igor Chaika. The main concerns are for the identity of the cities. The participants in the discussions say that "branding" and "urbanism" are being implanted instead of a unique history and wildlife, and they call what is happening the budget games of Muscovites. Alexander Antonov believes that "the initiatives of the rich nouveau riche in the field of urbanism" are not dangerous to anyone, maybe he will really succeed in waking up the city. Irina Trubetskaya writes that "it is very controversial to develop brand books with logos in the absence of approved protection zones and territories of monuments." A beautiful wrapper is the tenth thing, first you need to stop the destruction of the historical environment. "The approved protection zones and territories would immediately draw the cities" into squares "and it would become clear to everyone - where what is possible and where not." However, no such work is being carried out.
Continuing the theme, Ilya Varlamov talks about a new job that the Urban Projects agency has taken on in the city of Istra. Recently, the Vostochny microdistrict was completed there, which consists of apartment buildings with a height of 2-4 floors, a school and a kindergarten. The main problem of this place is the lack of public spaces; it was to solve this problem that the developer turned to City Projects.
Efim Freidin collects opinions and proposals on the development of the public space of the Pryvokzalnaya Square in Omsk online. Participants need to answer three questions:
1. Which of the existing elements are of value to us (for different reasons), why is the area still convenient?
2. What needs and enough change to improve it for use?
3. If we keep the share of public space and strengthen the function of the “city square” itself, the place of “representation of Omsk” - what new activities and objects would you like to see there?
The survey is conducted in the VK group "Omsk City for People", many suggestions were made in the comments to the post.
Finally: Arkady Gershman offered an architectural riddle in his blog: to identify a city from a photograph. Only six people managed to recognize New York, which looks more like Naberezhnye Chelny.
