The Novoperedelkino metro station, one of the busiest now on the yellow line - 16,500 passengers a day - opened in August 2018. Its interior was designed by the Riga architects URA / United Riga Architects, Evgeny Leonov and Alexander Dembo. The project won the 2014 competition simultaneously with the design of the Solntsevo station and both were implemented almost without deviations. The only difference is that Novoperedelkin does not have a design ground pavilion, which, of course, is a pity.
Novoperedelkin's project was not a favorite of the competition jury, however, the jury disagreed about this station and the winner was appointed by Deputy Mayor Marat Khusnullin based on his own preferences and the result of the popular vote, where the project scored 35%. After the first round, the architects revised the project: “vaults” with light ornaments, which were originally everywhere, remained only in the entrance lobbies and decreased slightly in height, while the main platform hall became quieter and was limited to one row of pillars along the platform axis.
Of course, the most striking solution of this project is “vaults” made of slotted metal cassettes with diode illumination. Collapsible cassettes for changing lamps and cleaning dust. The drawing of the plant ornament is generalized plant and most of all resembles, probably, Khokhloma. The backlighting can be not only white, but also colored, shades of cold colors are chosen: for example, in the upper part there is now a purple or greenish "sky", which can be considered an attempt to soften a little the tension created by a large and graphic ornament.
lobby drawings:
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zooming 1/4 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
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zooming 2/4 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
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zooming 3/4 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
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zooming 4/4 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
Of course, these are not vaults: the structure is not brought together and the lock does not hold. about with a stone. Six pillars, lined up in three rows, are subordinate to parabolic - or even lancet - contours, but their upper part serves rather as a volumetric shade, a lacy light structure that blooms on black "legs" of the bases, but only reminds of vaulted halls. However, it performs its symbolic task well: it seems that we are in the Faceted Chamber, repeated several times. The vaults and ornaments are a "neo-Russian" theme - I will not say what can be disclosed, but it is clearly indicated.
It must be admitted that a pillar with a massive vault is not only a motif of medieval architecture as such and of Russian architecture in particular, but also one of the favorite motifs of the architecture of the Moscow metro, especially deep-lying stations with two rows of pillars. This is one of the plastic differences between the Moscow metro and foreign ones - with thick pillars and vaulted structures, the architects seem to constantly emphasize that this is not just a part of the transport system, but the vaulted halls of the underground palace. However, another tradition dating back to Stalinist architecture is that the architecture of metro stations is directly or latently classical, even when, as in Novoslobodskaya, it uses “Gothic” stained-glass windows or, as in Kievskaya, tries to develop a national theme. The Novoperedelkino lobby is the first in this row, distinctly pseudo - (or neo -?) - Russian.
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zooming 1/5 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
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zooming 2/5 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
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zooming 3/5 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
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zooming 4/5 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
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zooming 5/5 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
On the other hand, it echoes the well-known pillar of the vestibule on Kurskaya, as well as in the hypostyle lobbies of many Italian palaces of the 16th-19th centuries or Menshikov's palace on the Neva. In principle, the volumetric structure proposed by the URA architects is a variant of the classic and very effective solution for the entrance space of the Renaissance palazzo, "overturned" into the "Russian style".
Meanwhile, if the pseudo-Russian style of the 19th century developed as part of historicism, and the neo-Russian style of the beginning of the 20th century was part of Art Nouveau or Art Nouveau, then the version of Riga architects belongs to high-tech. This is indicated by a lot, from polished metal to the collapsible light cassettes that have received so much attention here. High-tech and modern trends are felt more strongly in the platform hall, where the pillars are covered with polished metal and surrounded, like mushrooms' "skirts", with regularly alternating benches and "lean-toes". The alternation gives an even row of pillars a kind of "pitching rhythm" and brings a plot intrigue to the station space, which is otherwise very calm and free from unnecessary things. The Russian style is preserved on the ceiling, here completely flat, in the form of cassettes with the same ornament, which, refracting in the metal of the pillars, creates on their surface a pattern of blurry swirls, similar to the trail from a passing ghost.
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zooming 1/4 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
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zooming 2/4 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
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zooming 3/4 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
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zooming 4/4 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station Photo © Ilya Ivanov
platform drawings:
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zooming 1/6 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
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zooming 2/6 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
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zooming 3/6 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
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zooming 4/6 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
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zooming 5/6 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
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zooming 6/6 Interior of the publicly accessible part of the Novoperedelkino metro station © United Riga architects (URA)
Working with the Russian style nowadays requires a lot of courage and a sense of style, although attempts are made regularly. Someone will say that it turned out straightforward and fair, that it would be possible to pick up a drawing more interesting and thinner. Or he will decide that the Russian style here is verified by the pathos of Stalin's VDNKh: this joy with which white (or black, as you look at) flowers grow from the bases is akin to the emotions of the Friendship of Peoples fountain. Some, on the contrary, will rejoice at the development of the traditions of the Moscow metro and a new attempt to find neorus in the latest trends in high-tech and ornamental architecture, which has been popular for the last fifteen years. One way or another, the station has made it to the top of google on request, the architecture of the Moscow metro - and that means that it has already become part of our ideas about "underground palaces".
