See also interview with
Mikhail Filippov, 2017-29-08
In terms of scale, "Rimsky" is more likely not a quarter, but a traditional European town of several quarters. In the plan, the city resembles the letter L. In one part, which is now under construction, there is a house of seventeen sections with a semicircular courtyard, and across the football field from it there is a school - a triangle with propylaea. The first stage will be commissioned in Q4 2018, and the entire seven-stage project in 2023. "Rimsky" will be an ensemble of five squares on one axis, connected by streets. On the Central Round Square there will be cafes, shops, and on New Year's Eve - a Christmas tree, on Harmony Square - sports infrastructure, on Beauty Square - salons and spas, on Arts Square - places for creative activities for adults and children, on the Fair Square - a grocery that is fashionable today market. The number of storeys varies from 3 to 12 floors. Several kindergartens are planned in the complex, and residents will also be able to use the rich infrastructure of neighboring settlements. The first floors are public. Apartments will be of various types: from a one-room apartment to a penthouse with a terrace, two-level, mezzanine, with a window in the bathroom, and so on. The architecture is classical, Philippian.
Context 1: mass construction. The beginning of a beautiful era
Before talking about the numerous inventions of Mikhail Filippov, it is worth being amazed that we live in an era when mass housing looks like this. If I were sociologists and urbanists, I would start researching the phenomenon. The departure of the panel is a clear sign of the end of the industrial era, which it was an expression of, and more diverse and humane architecture is more suitable for creative new economies, the theme of which is a city with a capital letter. It seemed that the panel had no alternative, but over the past seven years, some architects and enlightened developers managed to formulate the concept of housing that is fairly affordable, but endowed with humane imagery of traditional architecture - in Russia this happened almost for the first time since the memorable resolution of Nikita Khrushchev on excesses in 1955 … This context includes the cities of Maxim Atayants, built around Moscow, as well as the city of Val-de-Marne near Paris by Piercarlo Bontempi (but the scale is smaller there). In the same vein, there are traditional New Urbanism cities like Poundbury in Great Britain or Seaside and Celebration in the USA, but they are smaller in height and closer in type to the village.
Context 2: other neighborhoods and cities of Mikhail Filippov
"Rimsky" is another classic city of Filippov. Since the 1984 manifesto, when Filippov presented a series of watercolors in which the panel area was gradually replaced by traditional architecture, and won the Japanese Style of 2001 competition with them, the architect has consistently implemented this idea. In the 2000s, the Roman House appeared in Kazachy, the Italian Quarter on Dolgorukovskaya and the Marshal residential complex on Oktyabrsky Pole, and for the 2014 Olympics, Gorki-Gorod was built in Sochi. And now another Roman city will appear near Moscow.
Filippov always thought of his architecture as the heir to the neoclassicism of the Silver Age, bypassing Stalin's Soviet classicism, which he considers a compromise. The typology of many of his works comes from the house-quarter of the Silver Age like the Benois House on Kamennoostrovsky Prospekt. The neoclassicists of the Silver Age had a street facade, and the courtyard was decorated with a colonnade only as an exception, the rest of the courtyards were utilitarian. At Filippov, all courtyards became ceremonial, with elaborated facades and a system of colonnades and arcades. This is done in the "Italian Quarter" and in the "Marshal". The same principle in the Rimsky UP-quarter, only the house-quarter has grown to the size of a city-house. But the main thing in Rimsky is not typology.
Context 3: historic city
The phenomenon of a historic city, which, judging by the tourist flows, pleases most people, is not so easy to describe and even more difficult to structurally comprehend and reproduce without copying. Filippov has been doing this all his life, studying the city through drawing watercolors. The method applied, in particular, in Gorki-Gorod, and now in the UP-quarter "Rimsky", is as follows. The beauty of historical cities, for example, Paris, according to Filippov, is explained by the superposition of two coordinate systems: radial-beam and rectangular Hippodamus grids. From this overlap, at the intersections, picturesque intersections with vantage points are formed, which make our walk through the city full of visual pleasures. Filippov reproduced this overlay in Gorki-Gorod in Sochi, and the number of views there is amazing. The same principle is applied in Roman. Streets radiating from a circular square intersect with a rectangular coordinate system, and those with another grid, and so on.
But it is not enough to compose a pictorial plan, you need facades articulated enough to be pleasant to look at - and in the "Roman" houses are divided into sections with facades 20-30 m long, as in a historical city, and Filippov's drawing of facades is always unmistakable; narrow streets and not very high houses are needed - and in "Rimsky" houses of different heights create a picturesque landscape of pitched roofs; we need leads that open in the alleys that interrupt the line of the facades - and in "Rimsky" the number of views asking for an easel is enormous. As Filippov himself said, it is necessary to fill the form of the symphony with melodies (see PR72). He is doing well with his "melodic gift". For example, in Gorki-Gorod, the drawing of the facades is exceptionally good - to the last window sash, and the rather refined colors of plaster, stone and brick (we are, of course, talking about buildings that were not damaged by builders). In the UP-quarter "Rimsky", in particular in the houses of the first stage of construction, the principle is somewhat different - not a classic massive wall with windows of correct proportions according to Alberti, but large modern glass windows, in fact, glass screens with order decoration, first used in the Silver Age, for example, in the Mertens Trading House on Nevsky. The combination of glass and order is a very promising way for the development of the classics.
After all, if the aesthetic arguments aren't convincing, there are economic ones. Eye-walking level, as urbanists explained to us (see.
interview with Alexey Novikov) is incredibly important. Because if, at eye level, a pedestrian sees beautiful facades made of noble materials, inviting doors to enter, permeable windows that testify to life behind them, then a person wants to walk there, small business flourishes, and people receive various and necessary functions within walking distance.
Context 4: Rome
Mikhail Filippov has a special relationship with Rome. In his works, he constantly conducts a dialogue with the great architecture of the Eternal City. The colonnade of St. Peter's Cathedral is reflected in the wings embracing the round courtyard of the house in Kazachy, and the Marcellus Theater, built in subsequent centuries, is in the form of the Italian Quarter on Dolgorukovskaya. There are Roman motifs in the Marshal (a sloping ruined wall) and in Gorki-Gorod. But in the UP-quarter "Rimsky" these are not only separate buildings, but much more. I will try to formulate what exactly.
The fact is that Rome is such an avant-garde before the avant-garde. It has a very avant-garde form of building a city. This is a city with a relief. Because of the hills, vertical "registers" of architecture are formed there. You raise your eyes, and above the building, at some distance, there is another building, and above - the next one that goes into the sky. And you mentally jump up these tiers. I even think Filip's famous "stairway to heaven" trick came from there. At the same time, this is not a terraced Mediterranean city on a mountain, so the upward movement is not predictable. The imposition of rectangular and ray grids has already been discussed. It does not prevent Rome, like all historic cities, from having a clear structure of streets and squares. But the most interesting thing is that when the line of the Roman facades is torn, it is not a courtyard of the correct shape that is visible in the gap, but a house standing at an angle to the street or some other corner composition. This "wedge" is very common. The dynamics are such that the "red wedge" of the avant-garde is resting. Filippov literally reproduces this technique in Rimsky.
I'm not even talking about the permanent interspersed in Rome of antique walls or arches in buildings 200 years ago. The second one sticks out from under the nineteenth century. An irregularly shaped piece of an ancient wall or arch protrudes from a regular classical facade, and Filippov also quite often uses this technique. In short, Rome is an architectural form of amazing power. Plus the wealth of classical harmony, strength and beauty, energy and complexity. Against this background, modernist architecture pales and weakens, so it looks out of place in Rome. It is strange that none of the architects noticed this avant-garde of classical Rome. And Filippov made it the theme of his work. The superposition of logic and the layering of eras plus beauty - this is the modern city, and about this Philippian architecture.
stairway to Heaven
The stairway to heaven is a proprietary Filippov technique that wanders from piece to piece. In the UP-quarter "Rimsky" it is embodied in two forms: either a staircase of arcades (porticos) on the facade, or a terraced composition of houses. Everyone can think of the metaphysical meaning for himself: from the song of Led Zeppelin to the Heavenly Ladder. The stepped arrangement of arcades is also found in historic Rome. It looks something like this: next to the main building there is an adjacent, late extension, and the arcade on it is located slightly lower than on the main one, but is proportionally connected with it. Filippov has perfected this technique to brilliance and is in all his houses. In "Roman" the facades, for example, section No. 5 are decorated with such stepped arcades. It turns out that, on the one hand, the building has a clear lower tier of arcades - and in general the house has a bottom, a middle and a decorated top, which is important for human perception: the eye is tired of monotonous, inarticulate facades. On the other hand, these arcades vary in height and seem to be mobile, a kinetic effect arises. If an architect makes a staircase from porticoes, he does not violate their proportions. Developing the classical canon, it does not encroach on essential things, and in this it differs from postmodernists.
Another version of the staircase appeared in "Roman" - the double spiral of Leonardo da Vinci, the staircase from the Chambord castle (see.
interview with Mikhail Filippov). These staircases are located in several houses, in towers that connect the residential sections. Along one spiral you can climb to the right section, along the other - to the left. Staircase towers with huge windows shine through the sun. Observation platforms are planned upstairs. According to the project, it was assumed that the stairs of Chambord would also connect the circular squares of the lower and upper cities (the first and second, not yet completed part of the "Rimsky"), but the decision has not yet been made.
Antique theater
Filippov repeatedly said that he was fascinated by the theme of a grandiose ruin - an ancient amphitheater, built in the following centuries, like the Theater of Marcellus. The architect saw modern dynamics and life-affirming meaning in this theme and tried it in the Italian Quarter and other things. In "Rimsky" it is no longer an amphitheater, but a round theater in the right two-level part of the complex, where an ensemble of five squares. An antique theater similar to the Colosseum surrounds the central square. The houses are terraced down to this square. It is like a game in the gigantic substructures of the Roman Colosseum and at the same time a dynamic modern form that brings together many different buildings with different facades.
Materials (edit)
For the UP-quarter of "Rimsky" Filippov invented some know-how in the field of materials (see.
interview). The problem of artisan quality in classical architecture is very acute. The industry was destroyed in 1955, there is nowhere to teach artisans, but this does not mean that they are not there or that they will not learn quickly if they do it. For example, Schlüter's Palace in Berlin has been rebuilt with excellent craftsmanship. Now the situation in the field of classic decor is evolving.
Underground City and Heavenly City
The idea of a two-level space, like the Chambord stairs, came from Leonardo da Vinci. UP-quarter "Rimsky" became one of the first Russian mini-cities in which a two-level concept was implemented, completely separating the upper, residential and pedestrian zone from the lower level, where infrastructure facilities, cafes and restaurants are located, where cars drive, and below parking. The lower level here is a full-fledged city with an active social life and even with its own system of squares. The upper level, subordinate to the current principle of "a city without cars" - is quiet and safe, squares, sports and playgrounds prevail here - it becomes a kind of Arcadia, the Heavenly City. If everything turns out to be built, the UP-quarter definitely has a chance to become a tourist attraction not only in terms of the imagery of modern classics, but also in terms of urban planning.
