The district on the left bank of the Dnieper, remote from the center, has been gradually forming since the early 1990s and has turned out to be a motley "showcase" of controversial architectural experiments of a difficult era. On the other hand, this is practically a resort area within the city limits with an abundance of greenery, summer cottages and free access to water. “We always try to set a new trend for the city with our projects, and the Slavutich residential complex is no exception,” says Dmitry Vasiliev, one of the founders of the Archimatika bureau. - But if you want to add colors and accents to the gray and dull Soviet standard buildings, then in this case, on the contrary, in order to get away from the coven of architecture of the early 2000s, we had to completely abandon color and whimsical plastic solutions in favor of a simple and strict volume. This object is a manifesto - a manifesto of brevity and simplicity, rejection of contrived forms and silhouettes, embellishment with small details. It naturally developed in contrast to the existing buildings."
The complex is located literally across the street from the Slavutich metro station. Large-scale project with a total area of 122,000 m2 will accommodate more than 1,200 apartments. They will be located in five towers from 12 to 26 floors, united by a stylobate. Stylobat also includes a large fitness center with an area of just under 3,000 m2, with gyms, studios and three swimming pools. A pedestrian courtyard with green areas, children's and sports grounds, closed to outsiders, was created on its roof for the residents of the complex. It was a perfectly logical solution that nevertheless caused a lot of problems. “The future operator of the fitness center insisted that the pool was located in the central part of the stylobate, and natural light was provided by the cheapest type of lantern with side glazing,” says Dmitry Vasiliev. openings around the perimeter. This "billiard table," as we called it, partitioned off the entire courtyard and interfered terribly. " We got out of the situation by breaking the roof of the pool into four trapezoidal strips in plan and lifting one of their edges in a checkerboard pattern. The side edges of the formed triangular "teeth" will be glazed, which will allow natural light to pass into the pool, and their upper part is planned to be covered with turf. This technique managed not only to meet the customer's requirements, but also to obtain the illusion of hills on the plane of the courtyard.
Another interesting solution arose as a result of the division of pedestrian space and motorways by levels. All passages pass at ground level, but in some places under the pedestrian roof of the stylobate part, which forms a kind of tunnel above them. In order to prevent these tunnels from turning out to be dark and purely utilitarian, the architects in some places provided inserts into the coating of colored glass beams, which form a kind of blinds. They will work in the light and the sun's rays, passing through them, will create vibrant colored spots on the floor and walls and will bring an element of play of light and shadows, thus turning the volume of the "tunnel" into a scene for sunlight.
The unusual trapezoidal shape of the towers and their seemingly free, incorrect positioning are actually not accidental: they were the result of calculations that made it possible to provide the necessary insolation while preserving the necessary useful areas.
“The traditional design standard for coastal Kiev complexes is to put three or four typical sections in a row at the same angle, we call them soldiers' ranks to ourselves,” says bureau co-founder Alexander Popov, “there are several such examples of monotone metric rows around our site. The last such "line" is located very close (a ridge of towers forming a kind of "tail" from our project to the shore) and should be commissioned in the near future. Initially, we considered the entire project as a single volume, from which we simply “cut out” the extra masses, resulting in a single composition of towers and stylobate. This made it possible to create a feeling of naturalness and freedom of the composition, which looks spectacular both from the neighboring Bazhana Avenue and from the automobile South Bridge across the Dnieper."
The facades are made in the form of a geometric mesh, "put on" glass volumes. Its drawing is mainly dictated by the desire of the architects to increase the glazing area and free the interior space of the apartments from supporting structures. The entire outer row of pylons is carried out beyond the boundaries of the outer walls of buildings, forming a load-bearing shell. Thus, it was possible not only to create a pylon-free zone along the front of the outer wall, but also to obtain a powerful relief of the facade, emphasizing it with overlap protrusions every two floors. Additional, already decorative, racks add volume to the picture. This will be especially noticeable in the evening, since it is planned to highlight the formed niche-slots.
Finishing of the facades is quite simple - the usual "wet" system. This is due to the fact that, despite the rather strict appearance, the complex has a fairly democratic pricing policy. This, as well as, according to the architects, successful layouts, rich infrastructure and consistent plastic solutions that give a sense of prestige - and ensure the success of the project, the apartments in which are in demand despite the difficult economic situation in the country.
Construction has already begun and should be completed in 2018.
