Alexander Poroshkin: "Our Motto Is To Work For A Person"

2024 Author: David Durham | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-17 17:17

Start

How did your architectural biography begin?

I graduated from the architectural university in Tomsk in 2006 with honors. For two years in a row I became the best student of the university and even then won foreign competitions. In my fifth year, I drove my own car, as I won the Grand Prix and received 10 thousand dollars in the American competition for the project of a complex for low-mobility groups of the population (see PDF of the competition project). Then my wife Natalia (she, by the way, also has a red diploma) left Tomsk for Moscow and got a job at Asadov's bureau. Since 2010, I have actively participated in competitions, there were a lot of them, including for energy efficient houses. In Asadov's bureau, I was entrusted with large objects - microdistricts and experimental projects. But no one will entrust an independent order for a microdistrict to a young architect, but an order for designing a house is quite.

I was approached with suggestions and we did four different modular housing concepts for the Chinese company Zhuoda. This house was built at the Mosbuild exhibition and presented at the Open Innovations forum. As a result, our designer went to China, and 50 houses were produced there in two months. In Asadov's bureau, we also met Ivan Ovchinnikov, the author of "Double-House", with whom we now cooperate, and with Maxim Malein, with whom I lead a group at Moscow Architectural Institute. We went to the City festivals organized by Andrey and Ivan. All these friendly and professional contacts were then very useful in life and work.

How was your MAParchitects bureau formed? Where did you get your first orders?

2011 can be considered a milestone. At first I opened a bureau alone, then I started inviting friends.

Contests and partners

However, you soon began to win serious international competitions one after another. How did such a young bureau manage it?

It only seems that the young bureau has started winning international competitions for no reason at all, but in fact, as you can see, we have vast experience. By 2015, we already had tenders for contracts, it was possible to show that it was we who did the object. At the same time, the Center agency appeared, which began to conduct international competitions, and a normal procedure appeared with the submission of legal documents and a portfolio. We began to go through these parameters. It turned out that we took part in three competitions and won three of them: the improvement of the embankments of the Kaban lakes in Kazan together with the Chinese bureau Turenscape in 2015, the Stromynka metro station and the redevelopment of the building on Dmitrovka together with Promcode in 2017. In 2018 we won the competition for the development of a master plan for Oktyabrsky Island in the city of Kaliningrad in a consortium with the British bureau LDA and WSP.

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  1/5 Redevelopment of the object on Dmitrovskoe highway - "Center Dmitrovka", Moscow © MAParchitects + PROMKOD (Moscow)

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  2/5 Redevelopment of the object on Dmitrovskoe highway - "Center Dmitrovka", Moscow © MAParchitects + PROMKOD (Moscow)

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  3/5 Redevelopment of the object on Dmitrovskoe highway - "Center Dmitrovka", Moscow © MAParchitects + PROMKOD (Moscow)

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  4/5 Redevelopment of the object on Dmitrovskoe highway - "Center Dmitrovka", Moscow © MAParchitects + PROMKOD (Moscow)

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  5/5 Redevelopment of the object on Dmitrovskoe highway - "Center Dmitrovka", Moscow © MAParchitects + PROMKOD (Moscow)

Many victories in high-profile competitions took place in a consortium with foreign teams. How do you build relationships with partners, in particular foreign ones?

The peculiarity of our bureau MAParchitects is that we know how to unite in consortia. Usually the architect tries to dominate, but we prefer the separation of duties. We won the competition for the redevelopment of an object on Dmitrovka with Promcode: they had a section on marketing, urban planning analysis and economics, and we had architecture and design. In teams with Chinese and British partners, we also did everything related to architecture. We did not go into other people's areas, we just met, assigned responsibilities, made a schedule. We use all possible services for remote work: Dropbox, Google Drive, Trello. This allows you to work in a team without sitting in the same room, since everyone's work can be seen in the cloud drive.

But the secret of competitive victories is not only in the organization of work?

The organization saves time, and the availability of time ensures quality. A good example is the work with Turenscape in the Kazan competition for the Kaban lakes embankment. We had a month and a half. The manager of the Chinese company, Stanley Yang, created a schedule, indicated how many people work for them and for us, and what should be received by the end of the month. There were written not only tasks, but also birthdays and weekends. It was clear who was absent when. And in the first week the whole album was outlined. It's convenient: you immediately see the ultimate goal - the album, and the rest of the time you just fill it up. And I didn't have to do a lot of work, which is then not included in the album and is simply thrown away. As a result, we had 200 pages along the Kaban embankment. In terms of the level of elaboration of each node and the general strategy, our project was much stronger than the work of competitors.

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  1/8 Development and improvement of the embankments of the Kaban Lake system © Turenscape + MAParchitects

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  2/8 Concept for the development of the embankments of the Kaban lake system, Kazan © Turenscape + MAParchitects

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  3/8 Development and improvement of the embankments of the Lake Kaban system © Turenscape + MAParchitects

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  4/8 Development and improvement of the embankments of the Lake Kaban system © Turenscape + MAParchitects

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  5/8 Development and improvement of the embankments of the Kaban Lake system © Turenscape + MAParchitects

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  6/8 Development and improvement of the embankments of the Lake Kaban system © Turenscape + MAParchitects

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  7/8 Development and improvement of the embankments of the Kaban Lake system © Turenscape + MAParchitects

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  8/8 Development and improvement of the embankments of the Kaban Lake system © Turenscape + MAParchitects

Why were you chosen by the Chinese architects Turenscape?

The system is simple. An open competition is announced, everyone who wants to submit applications. The Chinese did not have a Russian partner, and we did not have a foreign partner. We were told: here are five foreign companies without a Russian partner, they were also told that there are five Russian companies. We chose those we liked. The advantage of Turenscape was obvious, because it was about water purification, and they are specialists in this. We wrote them a letter, presented our portfolio, said that we want to unite. They said ok, we agreed and started working. It's nice that Turenscape won first place only with us, before that they actively participated in Russian competitions, including for the concept of the Moskva River, but they were only second.

Something I can't believe that everything is so smooth, if we recall the competitive practice …

It was different with the competition for the Stromynka metro station. There were three stations in the assignment: we managed to make Stromynka in detail, and the other two were to be worked out by foreign partners. But literally at eight o'clock in the evening on the eve of delivery, foreigners from the consortium tell us: "Sorry, we will work with another partner." We had to do their job in four hours. As a result, they did not make it to the final, and our Stromynka entered the short list and we won with it later.

What are the pluses and minuses of the competitive activity?

The disadvantages of competitions are legislative: when you sign an agreement, you give up your rights. Then the customers build with whom they want. Pros - promotion and potential orders. Even at the institute, I realized that competitions not only attract attention to the architect, but also give money. And when I started working, I received orders through competitions. Now we perceive contests as an advertising campaign. We are already overloaded with work, but we actively participate in competitions if we come across an interesting object.

What is the main thing in the competition project?

Consecutively pursue one idea. For example, in the project of the embankments of the Kaban lakes, we connected the entire territory with the help of three "ribbons": ecological, cultural and transport (bicycle and scooter). During the period of the USSR, no one thought about the connectivity of territories: everyone built up their own piece. We came up with the idea of connectivity and subordinated everything else to it.

There was also a competition for the Stromynka metro station. We invented a beautiful idea of a technogenic forest, transformed this image into a pixel picture, and came up with a design based on it. At the entrance to the ground pavilion, the shape of the descent downward was repeated in the form of lamps.

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  1/6 Design of Stromynka metro station, Moscow © MAParchitects

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  2/6 Design of the Stromynka metro station, Moscow © MAParchitects

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  3/6 Design of the Stromynka metro station, Moscow © MAParchitects

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  4/6 Design of Stromynka metro station, Moscow © MAParchitects

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  5/6 Design of Stromynka metro station, Moscow © MAParchitects

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  6/6 Design of Stromynka metro station, Moscow © MAParchitects

In the redevelopment competition on Dmitrovka, we won against well-known bureaus, because we offered a suitable function for the building on the Moscow Ring Road. We focused on the fact that the Dmitrovka Center is a live, flexible system that involves the combination of transport, logistics, warehouse and exhibition services. At the same time, the integration of the owner's activities into the chosen concept is logical and allows the creation of new business formats. The main idea played a decisive role.

The Bureau

What does MAP mean in the name of the bureau?

There are several meanings. This is Alexander Poroshkin's Workshop, and the roadmap (from the English map) in every sense of the word, because we are optimizing the design paths. Flexible horizontal organization in the office and distribution of roles allow us to succeed in large, diverse projects. Accordingly, we won tenders in different directions: the Stromynka station is the design, the residential area in Kaliningrad is the masterplan, the Kaban embankment is the improvement, the redevelopment on Dmitrovka is the financial model.

Describe your architectural method

When I was preparing to enter the Faculty of Architecture, I went to study with an artist. He said: look around, nature has already thought of everything. There is no straight river: where it hits the shore, it rises. It doesn't matter what you work with, you just watch how it happens in life. Therefore, for example, in the improvement of the A101 quarter, we did not level the site, as we often do, but used the natural relief: we simply tied all its curves with one path, which allowed local residents to get a comfortable walking and leisure space.

Or, for example, you need to make a general layout of the village. You open google, virtually "go" to Canada, Finland, anywhere - and look at the villages. Everything should happen and look natural. We have a project of the Ice Arena in the city of Ozersk. Its shape appeared like this: I wanted to fit the field into a circle, and to protect the entrance from rain, we made a bevel on one side. There is no need for excess height above the stadium, so the top was cut off. They answered technical tasks, and received an expressive sports facility. For the farmers' market project on Semyonovskaya Square, we experimented with a parametric shape, which is also an amphitheater.

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  1/4 The concept of a farmers' market on Izmailovskaya Square, Moscow © MAParchitects

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  2/4 Concept of a farmers' market on Izmailovskaya Square, Moscow © MAParchitects

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  3/4 The concept of a farmers' market on Izmailovskaya Square, Moscow © MAParchitects

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  4/4 The concept of a farmers' market on Izmailovskaya Square, Moscow © MAParchitects

What is the main motto of MAParchitects?

Our main motto is to work for a person, and it doesn't matter whether we are talking about a large-scale urban project or about an interior. When designing a residential building, I try it on myself. I am thinking about making it convenient to park the car, bring groceries to the house, and bring a child in a stroller. Accordingly, based on the behavioral characteristics of future residents, I plan ramps, certain parameters of the door and elevator. It is important for me how the apartment is located so that the noise from the elevator is not heard inside. Relying on human convenience, you will naturally coincide with SNIPs. We teach students personalization at Moscow Architectural Institute.

You have very different projects: there are wooden houses, and city blocks, and urban objects of the parametric type. How would you describe the styles in which you work?

People often do not believe that we did it all. We do not have clear style boundaries. Our projects are more like a bespoke suit. Having architectural experience and seeing a person, you try this in and The idea to process: to offer aesthetics and functionality, to build the right proportions, to choose the right material. Here was a client from Surgut. He ordered a house in Moscow with one-meter walls: brick - 500 mm, insulation 300 mm plus external cladding. He psychologically needs such thick walls. He understands that now there is money, and then maybe he won't, and wants to minimize heating costs.

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  1/4 The concept of prefabricated houses for suburban life - SWIDOM © MAParchitects

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  2/4 Concept of prefabricated houses for suburban life - SWIDOM © MAParchitects

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  3/4 Concept of prefabricated houses for suburban life - SWIDOM © MAParchitects

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  4/4 The concept of prefabricated houses for suburban life - SWIDOM © MAParchitects

If you look at our website, you can see that in 2010-2011 we had no direct lines. I had a period of maximalism. Each time I tested some new ideas. Sometimes I realized that it turned out harshly, and the next time I did it differently. Then there were employees in the bureau, and things became more consistent, but at the same time different. The individuality of the employees is reflected in the projects of MAP architects.

Do you easily associate with subcontractors?

Yes, we have established contacts with many companies, but we can act independently. If you know how to make working documents, you will always defend your idea. Let's say we have an object of 2013 in the Odintsovo area of 45 hectares, where we did everything ourselves. Already then we began to design the quarters. The customer had a project of 17-storey buildings of a certain density ready, but he wanted to try a different type of building with different heights.

Where do you find such conscientious clients?

The young bureau attracts young customers. Project managers came, who wanted to prove themselves. And we, and they are interested. In general, we learn from customers. They are all different. If you listen carefully to a person, you can learn a lot.

Customers

What is your scheme of work with a customer? How to formalize the process?

At some point, we realized that we do not have a standard contract, that an individual approach to each customer interferes with business. You spend a lot of time communicating with the customer, but it doesn't translate into money. We began to draw a diagram for ourselves: first, a pre-project study, on its basis - a technical task, after which there is a concept.

And who does the technical assignment for the design?

Not every business has a technical customer service (only large companies). A typical client used to say, “Hello. We need to make it beautiful. " At first we talked for a long time and tried to understand what was beautiful for him. It turned out that we ourselves did the pre-project research, then we wrote ourselves a task, then we ourselves answered it with a concept. That is, we, without noticing this, performed the work of a technical customer. Then we realized that it wastes time and costs money. We began to explain to the client that he must provide us with the initial data, GPR and so on. Because if we make a concept, and then understand that the original task does not correspond to reality, we will have to adjust the TOR. This is a long journey, sometimes measured in years. We began to make diagrams, showing that it is more profitable to order the entire project at once, and not a stage, and then we will be able to execute many sections in parallel and thus reduce the design time. Since 2017, we have been offering the structure of one "window": not just a beautiful picture, but a financial justification, calculations, analytics, and a systematic approach. This allows you to significantly reduce costs and show the customer that the work of an architect is always complete and cannot be divided into isolated stages.

And how do customers feel about your single window design?

The customer has not yet appreciated these efforts. He sees a more expensive price at the first stage and is not ready to pay it. But then he himself stumbles upon difficulties: he makes a draft design, realizes that there is not enough money for implementation, and re-makes a draft design. And only, having stepped on this rake several times, the customer realizes that the structure of one window is more convenient, when all stages of the project are done by one bureau.

In addition to contests, where else do the orders come from?

Sometimes it happens spontaneously. For example, we were asked to make a porch in the Port Plaza business center, where our office is located. We did it, and then it turned out that the customer needed to design the stadium. You make a small object for a person, and it turns out that he has plans for a large one. For him, we designed an ice arena in Krasnogorsk.

Tell us about the project on Oktyabrsky Island in Kaliningrad - the most ambitious competition won by your bureau

It is a large residential area of 380 hectares. The customer - the city of Kaliningrad and the operator of Strelka KB from five teams chose the winners at the end of 2018. The first place was taken by the LDA Consortium, MAParchitects and WSP. LDA did historical research and analysis, masterplan, transport schemes. We have completed the architectural part and WSP - everything related to water. We have a craft and university quarters there, a large public building. We thought about how to open housing for water. There are flooded areas, and it was necessary to redistribute the soil, create levels. We turned the assignment from Strelka into a real quarter.

Villages of wooden houses are one of the important activities of MAParchitects. Tell us about them

For Ivan Ovchinnikov's "Dubl-House" we have created a system for placing houses in Nikola-Lenivets and in the village of Snegiri. Sometimes the buyers of "Double-houses" unite to live together. We did research and planned how to position the houses in a space without fences, avoiding window-to-window situations and thinking about how people and cars move.

We also came up with our own concept of suburban life from prefabricated wooden houses and called it SWIDOM, because all the houses in the village have a view to the landscape or to the south. These are houses for growth, because they can be transformed as the number of inhabitants increases. Houses are delivered directly from the factory in a container with a set of tools, the container can serve as a construction trailer. Above the technical area, there are mezzanines that can become a bedroom. The highlight of these houses is a stained glass window, indoor and outdoor terraces. Their image is soft, carefully blended into the landscape. Everything in them is functional down to the millimeter. They are completely ready for production.

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  1/5 Residential residence, Podushkino village © MAParchitects

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  2/5 Residential residence, Podushkino village © MAParchitects

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  3/5 Residential residence, Podushkino village © MAParchitects

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  4/5 Residential residence, Podushkino village © MAParchitects

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  5/5 Residential residence, Podushkino village © MAParchitects

We have many options for private houses. There is a wooden energy efficient house, an interpretation of the Russian hut. In the hut there was a canopy and a cold veranda, a barn, all under a common roof, this is a whole mechanism. You take those basics, but add modern features like patios. There are duplexes - a typology rare for the Moscow region. In Podushkino, on a narrow site, we built a residence of several parts with various terraces, secluded and specific, combined the image of a traditional house with modern technologies.

How do you manage to keep in mind so many different large-scale projects?

On the contrary, it helps me. I love to work on many things in parallel, because findings in one project help answer questions in another.