Archi.ru:
Intercolumnium is 27 years old and has over a hundred employees. How was the bureau created? There must be some kind of history
Evgeny Podgornov:
Yes, a terribly long time, you could have served time and left … (laughs). After the Faculty of Architecture, I worked at the LenNIIP Urban Planning Institute, which fell into decay in the 1990s, there were no government orders, everyone was released on free bread. No wonder we decided to create our own architecture studio. We were drinking with a friend, and this idea came to us. The friend then went to America …
The name is Latin, and it does not begin with the letter "a" - is it because they did not come up with a sober head?
The title is a kind of test. I believe that calling a bureau should be either simple - like any brand, so that it sounds easy and remembered, or so that a person has to make an effort to understand so that the word will interest him. Intercolumnium is the distance between columns, a term for classical architecture. In Russian terminology, it does not exist, so they say intercolumnial. As soon as we were not called! Employees at one time even kept a list: "intercommunism", "intercolumbism" …
So where did your independent practice start?
Like many others: at first they made a couple of cottages, a couple of interiors. Then a real customer appeared: a new development company needed a project, from which it all began. At that time it was easier to start, but now customers have become selective and rarely trust young architects. We gradually increased the volume, equipment, studio staff … I must say, it's hard only with the first ten people, and then a single principle of work is developed and applies to everyone: we regularly discuss all projects, sit down, lay out, watch.
Is the variety of approaches in a portfolio a principle? How does this happen: because of the customers, "different hands" in the bureau, or because of your personal open-mindedness?
Rather from the latter. I perceive architecture not as a kind of self-affirmation of one direction. Architecture is the same fashion, it changes every 10-20 years: we see currents and directions, we observe fading and cyclicality, we are aware of epochs and movements. It is interesting for everyone to work in some new direction, but first of all the architect must work depending on the place of the task. To create an interesting and high-quality product, and not to get hung up on some of the styles, to reproduce it endlessly. Based on this principle, diversity appears.
How do you work, are there any well-established techniques for going from sketch to project? What is your starting point: context, ordering constraints and requirements, your own idea spontaneously drawn on a napkin?
Many projects are reconciled figuratively, and many are born immediately, really on a napkin. A striking example is LCD Fusion, this napkin is still with the customer. A lot of sketches are done instantly, there is a thrill and drive in it. I get pleasure from this: it becomes depressing if during the week no one called and asked to see the site, to express their thoughts.
An architect works to order: we are not artists, we don’t create concepts, and then we don’t run around the city trying to sell them. Although this happens: at your own peril and risk, since the capacity allows, to develop one of the sites and with a proposal to go to the developer, show how it can be. Sometimes this has an effect.
As part of the creative method, I also use this technique: I project everything onto myself, imagine, I would like to live in such a place? Sometimes after that, a colossal transformation takes place - in style, in a general direction.
What projects would you call the most noticeable, significant?
Of the latter - the residential complex "Krestovsky DeLux" and the residential complex "Privilege", I consider the brick Yacht Club on Bezymyanny Island to be interesting.
Residential complex "Mendelssohn" near the factory "Red Banner" turned out to be successful. There we worked out the style of constructivism in everything: we made mosaic panels at the entrance, elevator halls rusticated in concrete, one and a half thousand prints of Suprematists in the corridors, and developed the design of bells. It turned out stylishly.
From earlier projects I recall the entertainment complex Piterland - there is still the largest glued dome in Europe, with a diameter of 90 meters.
A significant part of your completed work is located in the historical quarters of St. Petersburg, as well as on Krestovsky Island - all these are high-class objects in one way or another. Are you more interested in designing for the elite?
I am interested in everything, but there are nuances. In mass development, the task of an architect is to create an environment and objects that live harmoniously with each other. In my opinion, it is better to build point high-rise buildings, but so that there is air between them, more greenery, and continuous routes. In our country, everything is still quite chaotic: they make crazy square squares with a courtyard, they build up the plot tightly, killing space, a piece of a school or kindergarten appears in the courtyard of the house - because of them, the yard may seem spacious, but the territories are still fenced off, space is inaccessible, a kind of deception turns out.
New highways, in particular the WHSD, have beautifully decorated the outskirts of the city, giving it a drive. I am a supporter of a whole cluster emerging next to the Lakhta Center, like Defense or Moscow City. Dominants in the city are essential. What makes the tower so good is that you go to some area of Kamenka or Pargolovo, and here there is a landmark, which is convenient. Another such business center with a stadium could appear in the area of the Cable-stayed Bridge, it will not hurt anyone.
The elite is a completely different direction. The main thing here is the place. The trouble with our city is that there are plots of different owners that border each other, but there is no common understanding of their development. Rarely does anyone try to take into account what was done by the neighbors. Unfortunately, the principle “who got up first, that and the slippers” works, and this affects the overall aura of the building. A positive example here is the house on Esperov Street. This is a game, a curtsy and a joke: since Evgeny Gerasimov built here “
Venice”, I thought that Catalonia would be appropriate. I think it turned out quite well.
Small houses of this kind are piece goods that cannot be multiplied. Classic Petersburg is made up of bright buildings with a pronounced style, frontal buildings through firewalls. The main thing is to understand tectonics and scale. When the scale is killed, it's bad, but when the street is filled with different styles, everything is more fun.
What other principles do you have when working in the historic center?
In the center, it is important not to "overwhelm" the neighbors, to comply with all standards, and at the same time to make his building. At one time it was believed that the best development for the center was as neutral as possible. IN
Law 820, for example, has a passage about the fact that new buildings should not be visible from open urban spaces. What should we design so that it is not visible? A phantom house? It is necessary to design in such a way that it is visible and that there is something to be proud of. With time and experience, one still comes to understand that a restrained ascetic building is sometimes more valuable than a bright one, entwined with decor. Although this is the other extreme - to consider that decor is bad taste for a modern architect, and everything should be done exclusively in modern forms. Some buildings, due to the lack of decor, seem to be sketchy and blank - I am not a supporter of this. There should be no brute force.
If you take half of the buildings in the city center and remove all the decor, there will be a wall with windows, on which there were rusty, sandriks, rods, cornices, the proportions of windows and walls will remain 2: 1. In a modern building, one would like to make the windows larger, almost to the floor, to reduce the mass of the walls, but this is not suitable for the neighborhood with historical buildings, it is better to make two double windows. Now each floor is money, so the ceilings are lower, the piers at the proportions are different, more compressed - it makes no sense to fill them with decor as they did before. The classic version of the facade no longer works, it is logical to look for something else.
And yet the tendency to stifle any project in order to preserve the city completely as it was a hundred years ago seems unreasonable to me. Again, a little over a hundred years ago, the city was rebuilt very intensively: the owner of the site became richer, he wanted to make his house better - he demolishes it, builds a new building. As soon as new technologies appeared, concrete floors - the whole Petrogradka was rebuilt beyond recognition, somewhere in twenty years. Then the historical buildings were constantly built on. Now everyone wants to ban and mothball the city. But this is wrong, it stops his development.
How do you work with a customer? Do you contradict it or not?
Customers have become more selective, many have traveled, looked, - customers have an understanding of the desired product. There has been a positive trend towards simplification, now everyone considers the economy, so attempts to build cottages on the roof, incomprehensible sloped roofs that require additional money to operate, and so on, are gone.
From an economic point of view, the situation is quite tense: there is a feeling of depression in the country, laws are changing, customers take a long time to make decisions. To reach implementation, you need to have a financial reserve, and still do everything very quickly - both design and build. If you start building without having anything, you can get high costs. The customer must definitely invest in facade solutions, whether in the historical center or not - it doesn't matter. Often it happens like this: we have reached the finishing works, but there is no money left, then the savings begin.
A solid concept is also important. There is an idea - everything is settled quickly, no - you can mess around as much as you like, there will be no result. A striking example: improvement of the Ushaika River in the center of Tomsk.
For three years Gazprom tried to find a suitable architect in the depths of Tomsk, they drew something at the level of palaces and balusters … We made an ultra-modern concept in a month, showed the chief architect of the city, he was delighted, and immediately began to do it. And all because there was an idea that everyone was okay with.
How would you characterize the current moment in your work: where are you going, where would you like to come?
Continue doing different and interesting projects! And it is important that everyone eventually has a message, a key that would make it possible to highlight this work in some way, to make it noticeable and interesting.
