Zapadnaya Dolina is located a couple of tens of kilometers from the Moscow Ring Road along the Kiev highway, behind the Vnukovo airport. It is often called an "architectural suburb" because the houses - mainly cottages and townhouses - were designed by Totan Kuzembaev, Yuliy Borisov (UNK project), Vadim Grekov (ART-GROUP "Stone"), Andris Trushinsh and BAR Architects from the USA. The first completely "green" Active House in Russia was also built here - it was invented by young architects from the Polygon experimental laboratory, which was founded by Andris Trushinsh, the chief architect of the RDI developer company.
They also own the master plan of the "Western Valley", where cottages coexist with other types of buildings, including KUBs - apartment buildings, also designed by Andris Trushins.
KUBs are located at the edge of the village and differ from the rest of the buildings by the utmost laconicism of both form and decoration. They are intended for those who are tired of the city, but are not yet ready to live in a private house. The name almost accurately reflects the essence - these are simple parallelepipeds with a flat roof and facades, decorated only with rows of identical elongated windows and a barely noticeable perforated pattern running along one of the verticals of the facade panels. There are no protruding volumes or details, even the entrance asserts itself, going deep inside like a garage entrance, and not protruding as a porch or canopy, as usual.
The houses are three-storey, each with 11 apartments ranging from 50 to 62 m² with free planning. Since all apartments are angular, the windows face two sides, but if you combine two apartments, then three. There is something to see from them - the village is washed by the Neznayka River, there is a lot of greenery, playgrounds and promenades around. To improve good neighborly relations in the village, all fences, if any, are visible and are only partially closed.
There are seven CUBES, each with its own color: three shades of terracotta, two gray, red-brick and white. The ventilated facades are faced with facade panels. Gray - fiber cement panels EQUITONE [tectiva] TE 20 and EQUITONE [natura] N251.
In this case, EQUITONE panels have a number of advantages. Each panel is unique and reflects the natural texture of fiber cement, which is composed of cement, sand, water, cellulose and mineral fibers that are responsible for strength. The panels are supplied in a maximum size of 3100 x 1250 mm, but if necessary, they can be cut to any size - in CUBs, this has resulted in a rather complex facade mesh of rectangles and squares.
In addition, the material is mass-colored, so it can be perforated and patterned, which the architects took advantage of. It is also important that EQUITONE facade panels are not treated with artificial colors, therefore they look natural. In other buildings of the "Western Valley" wood, brick, stone were used - fiber cement also fits well into this row.
With a laconic solution of facades, the choice of material becomes decisive: in case of an error, the buildings would look simple and “cheap”. Fiber cement, thanks to its texture and natural components, gives a sufficiently complex surface, but at the same time emphasizes the more democratic status of KUBs in comparison with other buildings of the "Western Valley".
