The new building of the medical center is located not far from the Moscow Zoo and the Krasnopresnenskaya skyscraper, at the intersection of Krasnaya Presnya and Malaya Gruzinskaya streets, on the site of a kitchen factory built in the second half of the twenties by architect Sergei Kurabtsev. The kitchen building, as well as several small neighboring buildings, for a long time belonged to the city hospital No. 32. Then, since 2006, it was empty, gradually decaying, until, after lengthy negotiations between the client "MEDSIGROUP" and the city authorities, in November 2013, an ambiguous decision was made to demolish the constructivist house. Instead, a new, modern, state-of-the-art private medical center was built. The customer undertook to allocate a share for the city hospital, and to design the architecture of the new building in the spirit of Soviet constructivism - in memory of the lost object.
The company KAPSTROYPROEKT was invited as the general designer, which was engaged in the implementation of the project, and developed its planning structure. The authors of the architecture of the new building and, in particular, its facades were chosen at a closed competition, in which not only Russian, but also foreign bureaus participated. Karen Saprichyan, head of the “GrandProjectCity” workshop, together with Alexander Asadov, proposed a compromise option at this competition, based on a modern interpretation of the motives of late constructivism. “We tried to preserve the spirit of the place,” says Karen Saprichyan, “and show respect for the existing urban environment of Krasnopresnenskiy district, the development of which was actively formed in the period of 1930-1980s. Today the most notable building of the district is the Vesnin brothers' department store “Gostorg”, built in 1928. In addition, the style of late constructivism seemed to us the most relevant for a medical institution: this is how, say, the Kremlin polyclinic on Vozdvizhenka or the polyclinic of RAO Russian Railways were resolved. The competition was won and the authors started designing.
In the first version, proposed by the architects, allusions to late constructivism were quite strong: a rounded bay window overlooking Krasnaya Presnya, large windows and double semi-columns, horizontal belts-cornices resembled, in particular, the buildings of Ivan Fomin. The city authorities approved the project. The customer, however, did not agree with the proposal, which was agreed upon and even received the AGR: the building associated with high-quality medicine of the new millennium, in his opinion, should not resemble Soviet architecture, but, on the contrary, belong to the new century, indicating with its appearance the latest technologies. The client even planned to implement another project with all-glass facades.
However, as Karen Saprichyan says, "thanks to the firm position of the chief architect of Moscow, Sergei Kuznetsov, our version, made in the spirit of Moscow constructivism, was chosen." The architecture, however, had to be extensively redesigned in response to the preferences of MEDSIGRUPP. A solution capable of satisfying everyone - both the city and the customer, and residents who are not indifferent to what is happening, and the authors themselves - were looking for a long time, despite the time pressure: the building was planned to be built (and eventually built) very quickly - in less than two years, from the fall 2013 to summer 2015.
The second and final version, which satisfied all the participants in the process, is less reminiscent of the architectural avant-garde and early neoclassicism, but the architects added allusions to Andrei Burov's "openwork house" on Leningradsky Prospekt. The same concrete mesh protruding from a glass, with a metal frame, "inner" surface; only here there is more glass, the lintels are placed wider, in places combining, as is customary in our time, two floors. The same predominance of verticals - but here they are less common, denser, and covered not with imitation of Venetian marble, as was the case with Burov, but with thin rustication. By the way, rustic, embossed blades, "layering" of the facade with ribbed, recessed horizontals - become a reaction to the urban environment, falling into resonance with the Posokhin-Mndoyantskaya skyscraper visible from here in the future.
But the main thing is openwork panels. Their drawing is generalized and resembles a Gothic web with abstract plasticity, subordinate to arcs, although not completely cut off from plant motifs.
The bas-reliefs are made of sculptural clay in full size: from 3.5 to 8 meters according to the author's sketches of Karen Saprichyan. They were also molded and manufactured by the "GrandProjectCity" team. “There were many variants of the drawing,” the author says, “there were many: abstract, echoing the design of the portals of the railway tunnels in Adler, made by me for the 2014 Olympics; vegetable, simple geometric and others. " Openwork reliefs, I must say, turned out to be an almost ideal solution to the problem of combining historical contextualism, within which the architects wanted to remain, and acute modernity, on which the customer insisted - as you know, few things are so relevant in the architecture of our time as a moderately abstract ornament. In other words, the panels made the building both historic and modern at the same time. For the works of the bureau of Karen Saprichyan, an architect-sculptor, this decision is also very characteristic, we can say that in this case the peculiarity of the author's handwriting helped to quickly overcome a whole knot of contradictions, at the same time endowing the building with a recognizable "zest".
In general, the architectural solution here is built on a combination of greenish glass - this is the corporate color of MEDSI according to the brand book, which allowed the authors to use “color” as an argument and in many ways advanced the process of agreement with the customer - with light, stone-like architectural glass fiber reinforced concrete, forming a relief mesh on the facades, which visually unites two floors on the longitudinal facades, and changes its rhythm at the street end, outlining each floor. According to the architects, they deliberately varied various architectural elements, using them "with different pressure": more restrained in the courtyard and more actively "on important visual points" from the side of the streets - all this is intended to create the necessary contrast and form accents within the framework of a certain commonality of techniques …
One of the notable plastic techniques inherited from the original version is a semicircular bay window facing the skyscraper, hanging at the bottom by a neat console and deliberately not brought to the level of the roof - a recognizable quote. The corner on the side of the intersection echoes the ledge with a smooth rounding.
The main entrance, located in the middle of the building plate from the Malaya Gruzinskaya side, on the contrary, is emphasized by a slight ledge - the facade breaks with a wide angle like a book (remember Kalininsky Prospekt, aka Novy Arbat, or the CMEA building, although here the similarities are less literal). In the place of the fracture, the facade becomes predominantly glass, and the thin embossed interfloor cornices of the left and right half of the building break off, meeting like fingers locked together - through one. Thus, through the difference in rhythm and the alternation of two-storey strips, the architects managed to visually divide the extended building into two volumes, as if fused "on the hinge" of the lobby. On the side of the courtyard in this key place is a ledge.
And besides, the new building blended well with the number of Soviet nine-story buildings on Krasnaya Presnya - height, color, everything is almost like native.
An important role in creating an individual image of a building is played by architectural lighting, with the help of which the authors reveal the structure of the facades, emphasize the individuality of plastic techniques. Openwork slotted panels received a special "bonus" - RGB backlighting in the full light spectrum; it delicately accentuates the inserts without destroying the integrity of the façade fabric.
The complex on Presnya was built very quickly, despite the complexity of the site and the problems associated with the demolition of the existing house. Construction began in 2014, and in the second half of 2015, the center is promised to be opened for patients. Visitors will have access to all departments - from therapy to allergology and immunology. There is also a day hospital, operating room and diagnostic unit. For the capital, this is a step forward in the development of medicine, albeit a paid one, but for the urban environment it is a kind of inoculation, an example of an almost literal, visually reflected "fusion" of memories of the old with ideas of novelty.
