The concept of the Tchaikovsky Universe theater, music and festival complex, proposed by the Fourth Dimension architects, won a closed competition held by the Moscow Region Glavarkhitektura in May 2019. It involved the construction of buildings for a concert complex, a children's center and a hotel to the west of the Tchaikovsky House-Museum, on a triangular section on the banks of the Sestra River, across the street from the house-museum of the composer. At the end of last year, the project was significantly expanded and now, in addition to the theater and concert hall, includes a branch of the academic school at the Conservatory - on the other side of the river, behind the city Sestroretsk park, and the reconstruction of the building of the Tchaikovsky museum, built next to the wooden house-museum in 1990- e.
I must say that the project in the first, competitive version looked large-scale and spectacular, and after enlargement, it considers appreciably about most of the city of Klin and can definitely claim both the role of its "new center" and the position of one of the largest architectural ensembles in the country, entirely devoted to music. It is called that: the main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region.
That, of course, corresponds to the circumstances and significance of the museum, which in recent years has been showing serious festival activity, turning Klin into a cultural center of the region, and perhaps of the country. Meanwhile, there is no suitable imposing venue for important concerts and events in the city - which, by the way, was the reason for the initiative of Dmitry Bertman, Valery Gergiev, Yuri Bashmet and Denis Matsuev, who two years ago wrote a letter to President Putin asking him to create a music center in Klin … Dmitry Bertman continues to support the project in the development process.
So, the project considers five sites. The largest of them is a spacious triangle with an area of 13 hectares on the river bank, opposite the Sestroretsky Park, north of the Demyanovo estate, from which a park with the ruins of a house and a small church has been preserved, historically associated with many famous names, from the widow of Paul I, Empress Maria Feodorovna to the composers of Rome. -Korsakov and Tchaikovsky's student Taneyev. On the site chosen for the theater and music complex, some time ago there was a hospital, whose buildings were mostly lost; remained a maternity hospital, which is soon planned to be withdrawn. There are many old trees here, especially on the steep slope of the river, and the height difference is 20 meters. The river is dammed and turned into a small reservoir with sandy shores and a spacious, landscape water surface. The Demyanovo estate forms the southern border of the triangle, the western river, and the northeastern one is defined by Sportivnaya Street, along which the Leningradskoye Highway route passes in this place. That is, the street is busy.
Behind the road is the actual museum-reserve, the wooden country-house "Tchaikovsky's house in Klin", which the composer rented in the last years of his life, with a small park, smaller in scale than Demyanovo, but better guarded and therefore better preserved. Reconstruction of the administrative building of the museum, stretched along Sportivnaya Street, is the second subject of design. To the north, behind the territory of the museum, on Chaikovskogo street next to the Stroitel stadium, there was a place for a new sports complex, it also entered the general complex. The site for one hotel was found to the southeast, in the back of the residential area behind the nursing home, a 5-minute walk from the main concert hall. Another hotel is located on the opposite side, on the other side of the river, but next to the highway.
And finally, the educational complex, a branch of the Conservatory - the second most important part of the ensemble - received a plot behind Sestroretsky Park, south of the pedestrian bridge, next to the block of five-story buildings being renovated. It is about ten minutes walk from the main hall to it, and this is the farthest of the pedestrian crossings between different parts, grouped around a central core, thought out for each direction and tied into a kind of network.
The network of pedestrian connections looks like a development and a derivative of one of the key ideas of the competition project, preserved here as well: the underground passage under the Leningradskoye Highway, proposed to improve the connection between the old museum and the new concert hall. Its exit is designed as a giant golden bell-shaped trumpet-helicon - sometimes in cartoons it is painted with notes flying out, denoting sound - here, instead of notes, people emerge from the bell.
It turns out beautifully and ceremoniously, as if the path to the Tchaikovsky house is decorated with a triumphal arch honoring the composer and at the same time resembling a mercury, iridescent version of Ladovsky's arch on the Red Gate. In the spirit of modernity, obsessed with digital and fantasy, here you can see the arch of hypertransition: between the new and the old, between the 19th and the 21st centuries. Functionally, the portal-funnel should replace the primitive passage that exists over the highway now, but it is more important, of course, that it becomes the iconic key of the concept: the “underground” pipe-sculpture unambiguously indicates the sphere of music, offering almost literally to pass through sound, albeit an imaginary one. - and, on the other hand, sets the plastic leitmotif of the arch, connected with the landscape and volume, half-open and at the same time wide open - a motive that runs through the entire project and only intensifies with its development.
The entrance to the passage from the side of the museum echoes the main idea: stairs in open holes lead down, in principle, as usual, but their walls are golden-copper, they emphasize that we are entering the very space of the "underground pipe".
Actually, the main complex, the core of the project, the building to which we drive along Leningradka or leave the "pipe" from the side of the museum, is a gigantic ring, completely circular along the outer contour, with a diameter of 150 meters. The ring unites two halls: the largest theater and concert hall, Onegin, for 950 seats, with a choreographic hall on its roof, and the small Philharmonic Hall, The Nutcracker, for 640 seats. Theatrical technical rooms, rehearsal rooms, a museum and a restaurant are planned between the halls. Both halls protrude from the ribbon of the ring into the courtyard according to the principle of "ring in reverse", the restaurant also protrudes, but slightly, so that the courtyard becomes three-petal.
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zooming 1/6 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 2/6 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Theater and concert complex. Plan of the underground part © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 3/6 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Theater and concert complex. Plan in the 1st floor level © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 4/6 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Theater and concert complex. Floor plan on the 2nd floor © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 5/6 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Theater and concert complex. Plan in the 3rd floor level © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 6/6 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Theater and concert complex. Roof and choreographic hall plan © AB "Fourth Dimension"
Between the ledges, in the petals, the building's ring is opened outward by three arches with musical names: prima, secunda and tertia, they look, respectively, at the corner of the "pipe" -transition, at the nearest descent in the river, where the authors propose to arrange an amphitheater, and the third arch is the smallest of the others. to the park on the triangular promontory.
All arches are smoothly resolved and resemble a curtain slightly opened from below, but not a literal image of it, since no “folds” react to movement and it remains a wide flexible slot in the body of the building. Rather, they can be compared to the response to sound waves from a trumpet - let's imagine that the music from the old house of Tchaikovsky prop e the hall is a building like a laser, leaving melted gold surfaces, a matter of pure art. From a distance, the openings resemble bridges in Gothic estates, for example, in Tsaritsyn.
Their difference from traditional arches is the absence of classic "heels": the fastening at the base is drawn with emphasis easily, which works for the effect of lightness of the line, as opposed to leaning on imposts. The gently raised line, I must say, has become a symbol of the project and landscaping vividly captures it, turning the river slope into a kind of karst formation.
In part, the shape of the bow arches is inspired by the modern profile of the river, where steep slopes are now crumbling with clayey sections. The line of the embankment fixes and strengthens this form, transforming it from an accidental natural formation into a theme consonant with the leitmotif of the whole.
It must be said that the "helicon" of the underground passage, visually different, is similar in meaning to the same theme of emerging from the ground, free operation of underground space and relief.
On the cut, the arches are golden, which will give sun reflections even on rainy days. Moreover, it is assumed that it will be possible to give mini-concerts under them. This is a cozy, warm and joyful image: people listening to music under a golden vault in front of streams of rain. The surface, however, will not be mirrored, but matte, the authors of the project explain, so that glare in sunny weather does not become excessive.
The first arch Prima, meanwhile, as a result of the development of the competition project, became glazed and turned into a common vestibule of both halls, which allows them to function completely autonomously. The imagery, however, has not changed, the architects interpreted glass as a light membrane that naturally holds the cylinders of the revolving doors.
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zooming 1/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 2/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 3/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Lobby inside © AB "Fourth Dimension"
The outer surface of the building, on the other hand, consists of glare. The surface of the outer walls of the "crystal" ring is conceived of glass, composed of many mirrored grooves, similar to large flutes and paradoxically reflecting everything around in a multitude of exedra-semi-vaults. The authors associate the arches connecting the grooves at the top with a musical tuning fork, although the iridescent verticals may also resemble org pipes. and on.
In the final version, the upper attic part of the “tuning forks” tubes has been carefully cut through. The surface is divided, the pattern is turned upside down, turning into a parapet of the exploited roof and moves apart in a zigzag pattern, revealing a semblance of a golden frame. A comparison comes to mind with a music box - a steam-punk device for our time. In this light, the entire building as a whole may seem like a “town in a snuff box”, a large-scale mechanism that produces music. In fact, it is, therefore, the facades reflect the essence well, although, of course, they are not a mechanism in themselves. On the other hand, the role of the frieze-cornice takes over, giving the building, in addition to its technical imagery, an unexpectedly classic regularity. After all, something from the fust of an antique column can also be guessed in it, although the entire huge ring became a “column”, which in the end resembles a cyclopean spolia, which fell into the context of a modern city like a marble column in an array of medieval masonry.
Our goal was to find a clean, built on one technique, in its own way aesthetic form, clearly tied to the theatrical and musical function of the building, - explains Vsevolod Medvedev. - Compact, in some way - classical, because, as we know, the center is designed for the performance of classical music. The image should be realizable, not too complex, - on the contrary, easily readable as a spectacular, theatrical building.
A fabulously beautiful place, the magic music of Tchaikovsky. Theater, Festivals, Art, History set the highest bar for expectations. The result must match. Formality is irrelevant. Having started designing, we immediately got into the world of subtle matters, one might say, of an immaterial context. This immateriality was embodied in the idea of the Place. Places of Art, Places of Power - this is a stage in the theater. In the role of the Scene, we have a clearing / forum / garden square, hidden in the Magic Forest. This Stage is protected / shielded by permeable curtains. The first curtain - the Magic Forest itself and the banks of the river - getting into the forest we feel that we are in a different space: scale, movement (or serenity), sounds, smells … This curtain is already there, it was built by Nature. The second curtain is the Ring, in which we hid all the impressive volumes of the necessary premises, from the outside it is unstable and almost invisible, reflects the forest, continues it. From the inside, the ring forms a stage area. Through this curtain, through the golden arches, we get to the square - the main open-air festival site. In turn, from this site you can see the Magic Curtain of the artist Lytov - a shimmering veil separating the foyer from the spaces of the auditoriums, each of which, of course, has its own curtain. It turns out such a multi-stage spatially-metaphysical nesting doll of meanings, sensations and spaces. Curtains protecting the Place from everyday reality.
The most important part of the project is a courtyard with a public space, formed inside a ring between the volumes of the halls. Its area is about 6000 m2, it is surrounded by steps of amphitheaters and it is planned to give concerts in the open air, which is so important for the festival agenda. Architects interpret the courtyard as “the most important cultural city square”, “included in the system of public spaces in Klin”. Therefore, the walls inside the courtyard are lined with composite acoustic panels that are neutral in appearance, but effectively work with sound.
The area is planned to be paved with slabs of natural wood - equally to improve acoustics and for the sake of a pleasant, natural and warm texture. In the central part, it will probably be possible to preserve the existing mature trees and, to revive the situation, from time to time to change the art installations on the square.
The glass of the foyer of the main stage, protruding into the space of the square, is also a curved acoustic triplex with a special layer and fastening. It turns into a huge volumetric, smoothly curved "showcase", behind which, especially with internal illumination, the flexible rods of the balconies will be perfectly visible, forming in the foyer space a sculptural dance of forms flowing into each other, similar to materialized streams of music, outwardly reminiscent of layers of fog. creeping in the evening along the banks of the river. In a word, this is a characteristic of modern theatrical foyers approach to the interior as a "sculpture behind glass", bright and attractive; such an interior works both from the inside out, enriching the space of the courtyard, and from the outside-in, since the glass of the foyer seems to be an intangible barrier that almost does not separate the interior and its surroundings.
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zooming 1/4 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 2/4 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 3/4 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 4/4 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
Behind the glass, among the bright streams of balcony railing, the "magic curtain" invented by the artist Maxim Lytov gleams - a curved wall that hugs the auditorium and forms the space of its vestibule, including exhibition areas, a wardrobe and a spiral staircase behind it, leading to a gift shop on second tier. The curtain, according to the figurative formulation of the authors, hides the "secret of musical and theatrical art." The wall quite obviously resembles a precious fabric, or brocade, or a golden ballet muslin, something from Benois's sketches: a slightly crumpled form with a hue of red and a clear shine promises a theatrical fairy tale. It could be covered with a golden mosaic - suggests Vsevolod Medvedev, head of the Fourth Dimension Bureau.
The main hall inside - with three tiers of balconies, which made it possible to plan its interior quite compact and achieve better visibility and audibility for most of the audience - was decided in a restrained way, the light balconies only slightly curve against the dark background of the walls, whose purpose is to absorb light, helping the audience to focus on the stage …
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zooming 1/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 2/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 3/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
It must be said that the hall is precisely theatrical and is designed not only for philharmonic music, but also for full-fledged director's performances. Therefore, the stage is equipped with impressive pockets and a headroom above and below - for mechanics. The minimum height of a full-fledged theater box is 27 meters, therefore, trying to fit into the height restrictions - and next to two security zones, a museum and a manor, - the authors deepened the basement into the ground, up to -6.5 m, and under the main stage up to -8, 5 m, providing a driveway for trucks with equipment and decorations on this underground level. The parterre of both halls is transformable, it is supposed to be able to completely hide the chairs and level the floor to the same level with the stage, as, for example, in Zaryadye, for the sake of modern theater techniques that value the opportunity to “go beyond” the stage traditionally reserved for performances.
On the whole, the task of offering a clear and easily readable image, built on a modern reading of the latent classics, can be considered fulfilled. The ring of the main theater and concert complex goes back to the classic rotunda, the hit of manor architecture, the impeccable shape of the temple of the ideal city - when viewed from the river it looms like a palace and may even remind of Pavlovsk. But no less about some alien artifact - modernity is set by generalization, the brilliance of the material, and is quite obvious. There is not even the notorious tension between the classics and its modernized interpretation: this is a large-scale, acutely new image built into the landscape, but spectacular and effective, calculated to serve as a point of attraction and gather everything around itself.
The buildings of the school, hotels and sports complex, now distributed throughout the city, are still at the design stage, but the project for the reconstruction of the nearby administration building is already available. Its existing building was built in the 1990s in a restrained postmodern spirit characteristic of its time, with plaster walls, small windows in wide, languidly decorated frames under a heavy gable.
The architects of the "Fourth Dimension", while preserving the structure of the building, radically rearrange the facade. He receives a decoration in the spirit of industrial architecture of the late 19th century: there are more windows, and therefore more light inside; they acquire arched outlines and fractional brick-style decor with consoles and columns. The historicism of the building becomes more tangible. But the main thing: the street facade is taken into a glass casing, in front of it a warm lobby is formed, similar to the foyer of a theater. Moreover, the new historicizing facade behind the glass is perfectly visible, like a museum piece in a showcase.
The stone pediment disappears completely, at the level of the roof of the existing building there is an additional space required for the museum, covered with a new metal roof - in the center it bends, forming an accent - a memory of the pediment, the outline of which is at the same time close to the flowing semi-arch, the symbol of the project.
Thus, the renovated administration building emphasizes - through the showcase theme - the museum function, at the same time it turns out to be figuratively connected with the main theater and concert complex, looks fresh and modern despite the "imputation" of the historicism theme borrowed from the previous building and reinforced by the new facade …
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zooming 1/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky Universe" © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 2/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Reconstruction of the administration building of the museum-reserve, plans © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 3/3 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Reconstruction of the building of the administration of the museum-reserve, plans © AB "Fourth measurement"
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In conclusion - a small remark, akin to how fragments of technical footage are sometimes shown after a film, showing the viewer the process of its creation. Initially, the idea was born from combining functions into two rings, and the logic of the author's thinking looked like this:
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zooming 1/7 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Formation of the competition project, 06-09.2019 © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 2/7 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Formation of the competition project, 06-09.2019 © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 3/7 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Formation of the competition project, 06-09.2019 © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 4/7 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Formation of the competition project, 06-09.2019 © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 5/7 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Formation of the competition project, 06-09.2019 © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 6/7 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Formation of the competition project, 06-09.2019 © AB "Fourth Dimension"
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zooming 7/7 The main theater and concert complex of the Moscow region "Tchaikovsky's Universe". Formation of the competition project, 06-09.2019 © AB "Fourth Dimension"
