The place between the territory of Expocentre, MIBC Moscow-City, Krasnopresnenskaya embankment and Krasnaya Presnya park is indeed a kind of cult: Sergey Skuratov says that many of his friends came there with rackets on weekends. Fortunately, the owners of the site did not plan to give up this function and asked the architect to design a modern tennis center here and … a high-rise complex with elite housing.
The calculation of the developer Capital Group was logical: the site itself is "central", while the adjacent Moscow City complex clearly lacked adequate housing. At the first presentation, the architects presented 20 options for the future skyscraper - the result of research that, in principle, can be built in this place from the point of view of shaping. “We wanted to distance the building from Moscow City as much as possible,” recalls Sergei Skuratov. - Firstly, we were going to build it in a completely different style. Secondly, I wanted to orient it more towards the park and the embankment. And thirdly, after checking the viewpoints and insolation conditions, we determined a certain angle in relation to the business center, under which this building was placed. It turned out that the angle is very similar to the one under which the Third Transport Ring crosses the Moskva River. There, in the center, it turns out such a large and almost equilateral triangle."
Among the options produced at that time with an altitude limit of 200 meters, there were "frames" and "stairs" and "hedgehogs". And the one that Skuratov proposed as the main one was a plate with super-technological facades - embossed, "unsteady", with a complex system of internal connections. All this diversity of the customer both frightened and impressed. Frightened - because there was a feeling that none of this could ever be coordinated and built. I was impressed by the depth of the approach, the scale of thinking, the storm of creativity.
The search for a shape continued, and instead of one plate, three appeared - even more graceful and thin because they managed to "stretch" their height from 200 to 267 meters: the final "thickness" of the buildings is 21 meters, which is very little for a skyscraper.
"Super-slim" towers are generally a fashionable trend: now they are building up Manhattan like that. Unnatural "thinness" is their main feature: you seem to constantly challenge nature, living in a building that seems to be about to collapse. It's like balancing on the edge of an abyss - pleasure for the rich and powerful. One of these skyscrapers commissioned by Five Points Development
designs the Meganom bureau in New York.
However, it should be noted that in Skuratov's version "harmony" is not extreme and even comfortable. The towers, installed on the "green" podium, linking together the public spaces of the complex, are oriented towards the park and with narrow end facades overlook exactly the water. They do not argue with each other and do not overshadow each other. Their relative position could be considered simple if it were not for the verified distances in terms of composition, views, insolation. “The first tower is on the axis of the first line of Moscow City, the second is on the axis of the street that separates the first line and Afimall, and the distant tower is along the Afimall axis,” explains Sergey.
The placement of the buildings partly determined the direction of the dynamics of the facades: as is always the case with Skuratov, the materials with which he operates are much thinner and deeper than they seem. Up and down to the water surfaces made of high-tech glass (directly into them are integrated ventilation valves, sun and heat protection) gradually "thinner" and dissolve. The use of a special lightened glass contributes to the realism of the effect (“My skyscrapers will be the brightest of all the surroundings!” - says the architect). And when moving deeper into the site, on the contrary, the facades become more material thanks to the more and more clearly visible and proclaiming aluminum lamellas, which just cover the ventilation grilles.
There is one more peculiarity in the plastic of the facade volumes - M-shaped "recesses" from those ends that face the river. And if the console "cutout" in the tower closest to the water was made specially so as not to block the view of the "Moscow City" for those who walk along the embankment, then there is no functional reason for the "notches". Skuratov himself reflects on the image of a "compressed" facade, which takes on the pressure of the emptiness of the Moscow River space. Someone will see allusions to the Kremlin wall, an allusion to the "Moscowness" of these objects - and they, too, will not be far from the truth.
It is quite obvious that the project has evolved from a variable and rich - to a subtle and, probably, the only possible concise solution, through cutting off the excess. The closest context of the towers is the Moscow City group of skyscrapers, so there could be no mistake here - Sergei Skuratov says that for some time he even doubted whether skyscrapers were needed in this place at all … The “tree” has considerable requirements: it is necessary to maintain the bar, to be no worse, and preferably better than everyone else. Therefore, light glass, steel, modern materials and, at the same time, a light, simple form were chosen.
However, the towers cannot be called “simple” - like any 200-meter structure, they are extremely difficult in engineering terms, due to their height and thin silhouette, the need to fight sailing - these problems are dealt with in the bureau by Mikhail Kelman. In addition, a ventilation and heating system unique for Russia has been developed: it uses thin slots located in apartments in front of the facades and allows individual settings for each apartment - this system was developed by Alexander Kolubkov.
The complexity of the task was also due to the mixed function: in addition to the fact that the towers stand on a five-tiered underground parking lot, and the stylobate accommodates a two-tiered public space with retail, the towers themselves combine housing and offices. One of them, which is farther from the river, is completely residential, in the other the offices occupy the lower part, in the third the upper one - all of them are equipped with separate entrances, lobbies and elevators, including high-speed ones.
The second, no less important component of the genius loci of the project is determined by the proximity of the park and the memory of the old courts, which, as we remember, inherit a semi-underground tennis part with a developed spatial plot as part of the complex. The courtyards are assigned to the eastern part of the territory - a triangle next to the border of Krasnopresnensky Park, separated from the towers by an unnamed passage; it was impossible to build here, but it is possible to place a sports infrastructure with a green roof. One of the courts - open - occupies a lawn from the side of the entrance transparent pavilion. It provides access to a large community center with a fitness club, swimming pool, supermarket, cafe, restaurant and a five-level underground car park. Raising the surface of the site to a height of a little more than 4 meters, the green roof of the pavilion becomes a "springboard" for organizing an amphitheater here with a picturesque view of the embankment.
The main part of the courts is hidden underground - 7 gyms are separated from each other by soundproof glass partitions and arranged around a central space, gaping in the green "roof" with a triangular cutout. Almost the entire inner space of the courts is visible through it. And from them, in turn, the hill and greenery are visible. In the warm season, the upper stained-glass windows of the partitions can be opened, letting in not only light, but also air. It seems that no one has ever built such courts with a depth of almost 16 meters to Skuratov.
In addition to the amphitheater and the "tennis window", a cozy green "courtyard" on the roof of the pavilion will be complemented by an artificial pond and a playground. Here, on inclined consoles, the volume of one more view restaurant will be "suspended".
But the main architectural dominant (not counting the towers "dissolved" somewhere in the height) will be a pedestrian bridge thrown across the road between the embankment and Krasnogvardeisky passage and connecting residential buildings with an observation deck above the park. This "bridge to nowhere" will in fact lead straight to the epicenter of cultural life: in the future it is planned to additionally glaze it, insulate it and eventually turn it into a spacious art gallery (it is not without reason that the bridge is 4 meters wide and more than 100 meters long).
The construction of the complex has already begun and will be completed according to plan in 2020. Much earlier, a sales office designed by Skuratov's bureau will appear on the site. This will be a mini-version of one of the towers - a six-story glass volume. Inside, there will be six options for the style and finishes for the interiors, which will be developed by Antonio Citterio. He takes over all the apartments and penthouses, but the tall 20-meter lobbies Skuratov and the Italian will do together. It is interesting to see how the stylish simplicity of the first will be set off by the deliberate bourgeoisness of the second.
However, first of all, the high-rise buildings themselves will be "in sight" - and this, according to Sergei, is the main challenge in the construction of a skyscraper: the building is visible from all sides, and all your mistakes and blunders are in the public domain. This is hyperresponsibility to the city, and, as in any large-scale project, it will hardly be possible to do without problems.
But Skuratov, as you know, is not one of the shy ones. He accepts the serve.
