An article about this project was published on November 27, after which the editorial office received a letter from the deputy of the Sokol municipal district Daria Novozhilkina demanding a refutation of the information that “the house suffered several fires, is in a terrible state, and now, due to its dilapidation, it has been designated for demolition . “In reality,” writes Daria Novozhilkina, “the building has never been destroyed by fire, it is in good working order and there are no grounds for recognizing it as dilapidated.” We have removed the text about the project from publication in order to understand the situation, and now we are returning a story about the project with new comments.
We are talking about a building with the address: Moscow, st. Sandy, house 10. The house was built, according to information published in wikimapia, in 1949. It also says that the house was "lived by employees of the Kurchatov Institute and nuclear physicists."
An editorial rebuttal follows:
The editors have no evidence that the information about several fires carried over by this house, about its terrible condition and its definition for demolition, correspond to reality. On this basis, and also relying on the allegations given in the letter addressed to the editorial board of the deputy Daria Novozhilkina, the editorial board refutes this information
Meanwhile, the editors have at their disposal the text of ARI (act of permitted use, dated 15.05.2008 and extended on 27.09.2009, with the address Peschanaya St., property 10), where, among other things, it says: “On the site there are 4 recommended for demolition -storey residential building and 45 metal garages, recommended for conclusion. A cursory study of the history of the site showed that the building permit here was issued by the Moscow government and signed in 2004 by Yuri Luzhkov, but withdrawn by the city administration in 2012. Work on the published project was carried out at a time when the permits were valid; the project was finalized at the request of the customer and later.
Despite the fact that the building permits have been revoked, we recognize the right of the architects - the authors of the project to publish their work and below is the original text describing the creative idea. The refuted phrase is shown crossed out. ***
Moscow, "Falcon", Sandy street. Workshop "Fourth Dimension" on a site with an area of slightly more than one and a half hectares, designs a residential complex: three streamlined towers - three large volumes, in terms of similar to stones smoothly hewn by water, as if accidentally thrown ashore by a wave. On the one hand - the strict rhythm of the Stalinist quarters, on the other - by no means streamlined towers of the eighties. It is with an ensemble of three such towers that the projected complex has something in common with its three-part composition.
The authors deliberately refused to continue the quarterly, closed line of Stalinist buildings: avoiding the appearance of blank walls and relying on maintaining the maximum openness of spaces with views of the neighboring park. And the stone towers literally grow in the middle of the green massif adjacent to the park, letting air into the courtyard of the complex and not blocking anything - even the Church of All Saints of the Patriarchal courtyard standing a little in the distance. But the proximity to the temple imposes strict restrictions, including in height. And, despite the fact that thirty-storey buildings have already been built nearby, and the GPZU allowed twenty-two, the architects decided to stay on thirteen floors. And instead of two high buildings, they proposed three, commensurate with the surroundings - the complex outline of the site made it possible to arrange the buildings so that they did not obscure each other. At the same time, it was possible to preserve a fairly spacious courtyard space, free from cars, saturated with greenery, children's playgrounds and walking areas. And in the western part - on the inner courtyard hill - a two-story kindergarten for 55 children, painted in the same style as the residential towers - another tiny atoll in the sea of urban life.
But all this will be later, and now there is a residential building on the site, which was once a school. The house has suffered several fires, is in a terrible state, and now, due to its dilapidation, has been designated for demolition. As one of the authors of the project, Vsevolod Medvedev, said, given the circumstances, the customer undertook to relocate all residents of this school house to one of the buildings of the new complex, having built it long before the demolition of their dilapidated dwelling.
In addition to the complex environment and situation on the site, which certainly had to be reckoned with, there are still difficult grounds here: an underground river crosses the site. But the client gave the architects almost complete freedom, trusting their professional experience and taste.
As a result of a long search for a solution, a simple and easy-to-read concept emerged from a large number of complex sketches. The main idea of the project is the absence of corners. While winding between the buildings, a person does not encounter any visual obstacles. His gaze seems to be twisting in a spiral, following the smooth flowing lines of the facades.
All three volumes are solved in different ways, but they clearly show a smooth transition from the rather heavy decoration of one of the buildings, made of natural stone, to the almost completely glass, weightless facades of the V-shaped tower in the plan, referred to the interior of the site. The first, stone, building, located closer to the front of the Stalinist houses, adopts some of their features, without copying the sample and not mimicking it. Its architecture perceptibly gravitates towards the classics. There is a clearly expressed rhythm of windows, and horizontal ribbons of cornices, and a characteristic coloristic solution, and, of course, stone decoration, which forms a monumental and austere image.
The other, "transitional" bloc is distinguished by a more daring, modern character. The horizontal rhythm of its cornices now and then gets confused by the inclusion of vertical slats or the frequent cutting of large square windows. Its facades seem to be more open and varied. The third and most radical volume is in glass and metal. This tower, as it were, refuses to look back at the surroundings, demonstrating lightness, permeability, maximum openness, and most importantly, belonging to the architecture of the 21st century. The only curtsy towards the neighbors is the same cornices tightly encircling the building around the perimeter with wide steel ribbons.
The unifying element is the penthouses that are equally designed for all three towers, somewhat reminiscent of the hats of graduates of European universities. And below, at the level of human eyes, the authors clearly indicate the commonality of the style of the buildings: along all the first floors, there are large glass showcases and open galleries under awnings, allowing you to move around the courtyard without fear of getting wet in the rain. The project is accompanied by charming, as is now customary, details of the improvement: a backlight tape over the sidewalk, a herringbone pavement with strokes of lamps built into it, rocking chairs, whose streamlined silhouette resembles house plans.
Talking about the project, Vsevolod Medvedev complained that the complex turned out to be too restrained and somewhat archaic. However, thanks to this approach, the new architecture, which is growing in the line of dense Moscow buildings, does not destroy its integrity, but, on the contrary, tries to preserve the gradually elusive connection of times.
