Four years ago, we spoke in detail about the project of the residential complex "Malaya Ordynka, 19" - now the house has been completed. It was built by Sminex on a quiet street of Zamoskvorechye - in a place so central and correct for elite capital housing that no beautiful foreign-language names are required: the address speaks for itself.
Let us recall that the zest of the architectural concept is that the extended facade along the red line of Malaya Ordynka is divided into three parts, visually resolved as three different houses: glass, brick and stone, but subordinate to the same height and general rhythm. The house is designed in the paradigm of delicate contextual development, which is necessary in the historical center of the city, but using the method of modern architecture, without stylization and historicism.
Strictly speaking, the description of the idea ends here. All this allowed the project to go through the advice and approvals quite smoothly; and even - fortunately - an option was implemented with a glass facade in the northern block, and not a beige-brick one, proposed at some point in response to some wish.
The house stands on two levels of underground parking, which occupies the entire spot of the site, the entrance is from Malaya Ordynka. The residential part is divided into three sections, but they do not quite correspond to the division of the street facade, since the plan of the house is L-shaped: in the northern part, the volume turns into the courtyard, and the third staircase and elevator node is located there. On the south side, the house, on the other hand, retreats from the neighboring office building built in the 1930s and hangs with a console 6 meters high above the passage for special vehicles. The yard is closed from other cars.
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zooming 1/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. Section © ADM
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zooming 2/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. Situational plan © ADM
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zooming 3/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. Transport scheme © ADM
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zooming 4/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. Master plan © ADM
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zooming 5/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. 1st floor plan © ADM
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zooming 6/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. 2nd floor plan © ADM
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zooming 7/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. Plan 3-5 floors © ADM
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zooming 8/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. Plan of the 1st floor © ADM
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zooming 9/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. 2nd floor plan © ADM
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zooming 10/10 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka. Facade. Option 2. Project, 2016 © ADM
The apartments are varied, this class of housing can afford large areas of apartments, up to 170 m2; penthouses on the top floor have their own exits to the exploited roof, from where wonderful views of Zamoskvorechye and the Kremlin open.
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zooming 1/4 Types in the exploited roof of the residential complex Malaya Ordynka, 19 Photo: Archi.ru
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zooming 2/4 Transparent railing. Types in the exploited roof of the residential complex Malaya Ordynka, 19 Photo: Archi.ru
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zooming 3/4 Types in the exploited roof of the residential complex Malaya Ordynka, 19 Photo: Archi.ru
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zooming 4/4 Types in the exploited roof of the residential complex Malaya Ordynka, 19 Photo: Archi.ru
The first floors are given over to the lobby and commercial and public functions, as is customary now, especially in the city center. Let's hope that some interesting tenants will appear there soon. Maples with rather lush formed crowns are planted along the outer edge of the sidewalk.
In a word, many rules are observed here - there are both the necessary elements of elite housing in the center, and the response to the requirements for construction in the historical city, as well as characteristic techniques and approaches to it, an important place among which is, of course, the fragmentation of the building line into separate ones that facilitates perception. at home: “initially two parts were planned, which would correspond to the division of the street front into sections, but then we came to a more harmonious three-part composition,” says Andrey Romanov, head of ADM architects.
Another characteristic modern technique is the console, which hangs over the passage and at the same time is slightly moved forward. It contains a certain degree of engineering courage that can surprise a passer-by: a corner piece of the house naturally "rode" out of the crowd and "hung". On the one hand, the console has something in common with traditional bay windows, but - in the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th, architects could not afford this, it is rather a technique from the arsenal of constructivists, and at the same time, its belonging to the 21st century is quite obvious.
The console “stops” the movement of the façade system, puts a sort of comma in it, preventing the house from being perceived as just a part of the red line of incomers of different times. A small, delicate, but noticeable accent corresponds, in addition, to Iversky lane, which overlooks Malaya Ordynka opposite the bay window.
But the value of the house is probably not limited to either one or the other: neither modernity, nor the necessary contextuality. The complexity of the task and the success of the result, one must think, lie in the found balance between restrained integration into the composition of the city and an abundance of emotions: details, texture, work with scale and drawing, plastic plots, enclosed, literally "packed" in its architecture. They are what make it interesting to look at and a reason to stop your gaze.
Only by looking at the real resulting house, you can feel the effect of combining different surfaces. For example, feel the contrast of cool brick and warm wood in the bell of a perspective entrance.
Or the sharpness of the joining of two materials popular today, stone and brick, allowing you to feel the "home" softness of one and the metallized rigidity of the other - they really look like two very different houses and could, in principle, be so. Although some lines, especially horizontal ones, are clearly docked, and finding similarities and differences can turn into a rather exciting experience.
The metallized sheen of the scale in the brick of the central facade gives the surface, especially in the sun, an intense shimmer in the transitions from orange-terracotta to silver-violet, bluish, which reminds of Vrubel's majolica: they also shimmer with an iridescent film. But in this case, the pictorial brilliance does not spread, it is placed within the framework of a strict system, as if crossed with something textile. Moreover, not brick was used, but transom tiles, and in the textured parts the corners do not bulge, but more resemble ribbons of embossed weaving, which in turn rise along the facade in a large meander - I just want to say: here it is, a metaphor of urban fabric, as if projected onto a brick facade.
The gloss of the brick surface echoes the dark, but also shiny metal of the balcony railing. His drawing is the author's, and in relation to the project it has changed, it has become less vegetal and more abstract: the lattice seems to consist of metal contours of beach stones stuck together in lace, very lively, with the effect of "wiggling" the surface, too, albeit quite remote, not to be a quote reminiscent of modernity, but from the graphic side.
The overall coldish tonality of the central part is also supported by the glitter of the window glass, which, on the other hand, is perceived as the "plenipotentiary ambassador" of the neighboring, northern, glass façade. Here, the panoramic windows are placed in the outline of a gray metal frame with deep extensions. Between their horizontal "guides" there are figures of curved glass similar to translucent curtains. Strictly speaking, they are not only similar, but also act as curtains, covering the bedroom spaces from prying eyes. In addition, curved glass also covers the window frames, and where there is none, large glass without joints was used, which is very impressive: from a distance it seems that the stripes of floors are tightened with completely solid glass, in front of which someone has gathered glass folds into groups, like knuckles on the abacus.
The folds of curved glass are certainly one of the most striking and attractive elements of the project. They seem to be a precious crystal curtain. Plastic and translucent "cold thread" attracts the eye and at the same time catches the sun's rays, transmitting glare into the street space.
It cannot be said that in Moscow there has not yet been a decorative "cold thread" or bent glass - both have happened, each time attracting attention. But in this very combination, where curved glass takes on the role of sculpture, there was no screen-decoration, therefore it is perceived unexpectedly fresh. Unambiguously indicates the modernity of the house, even makes you admire this quality of modernity, the technicality of the crystal facade. But it doesn’t turn into a declaration of a fashionable solution, it doesn’t "shout", it is kept on the edge, which is important.
The third facade, as we already remember, is stone-wooden, it feels the warmest, it is not for nothing that it is located in the southern part and, moreover, turns into the courtyard and develops where its more intimate and cozy solution is appropriate. Limestone, the most traditional, if not the classic material of elite construction of the last twenty years in Moscow, is covered with horizontal shading of thin grooves, which gives its surface the necessary, but very light, almost tulle relief, an unobtrusive proportion of light and shadow and, most importantly, completeness. A lot of wooden "frames" along the inner contour of the windows make the facade visually two-layer, dividing the openings into five types (if we count the bay window, then six), and forming a complex, but subordinate to the system, game.
Balconies appear here: they are small outside and more impressive in the courtyard, they open and revive the walls, accentuate the silence around - because only in a calm city you can go to the balcony not out of necessity, but for pleasure.
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Image 
zooming 1/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 2/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 3/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 4/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 5/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 6/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 7/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / courtesy of ADM
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zooming 8/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 9/9 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
In general, the house is not only divided into three parts along the facade - an interaction and hierarchy arises between them, based, it seems to me, on the movement from north to south, from icy glass to the confluence of terracotta and metal, and then to pale yellow stone and yellow-orange wood: a sequence of facades takes us from a beautiful, but somewhat cool futurism to a cozy "sunny" version of the house, which fully unfolds in the courtyard.
The courtyard is a separate story, the "fifth facade", the space of which is working, however, so actively that you start to think more about the "fifth dimension" - its small area, 30 x 40 m, is so full of changes of impressions. Like a large chessboard from "Alice Through the Looking Glass", although not so strictly, the courtyard is lined into rectangles: two lawns, three surrounded by thuja bosquets "study for quiet conversation", there are wooden chairs and tables.
The most interesting part in the center is a raised lawn, as if pushed up from the ground, or, conversely, cut along the edges to a rectangle, a lawn with hills of geoplastics. It has a technical sense: the courtyard, as we remember, is located on the roof of an underground parking lot, and a small hill is appropriate to accommodate a sufficient amount of soil for an adult tree, providing a "reserve". But the result was also plastically interesting: either the courtyard received a volumetric inlay with hilly terrain, or here a certain "carpet" froze in the granite banks.
The picture is complemented by two more raised lawns with built-in benches and, most importantly, a dry fountain of cages: some marble pebbles, others stone "circles on the water", similar to checkers.
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zooming 1/6 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka / ADM architects Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / courtesy of ADM
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zooming 2/6 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 3/6 Residential house on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 4/6 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / courtesy of ADM
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zooming 5/6 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
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zooming 6/6 Residential building on Malaya Ordynka Photo © Yaroslav Lukyanchenko / provided by ADM
Finally, a small but complex playground designed by Druzhba and combining slides, caves, a climbing wall and a drawing board is leaning against the eastern wall of the courtyard.
Of course, you cannot get lost in such a courtyard, but there are elements of a park labyrinth here. Despite its small size, it is impossible to assess it at a glance while standing at ground level. When viewed from different positions, it is perceived differently, plays out several scenarios, both for children and adults - this is a multi-component space, orchestrated in such a way that its complexity does not turn into cramped space. It feels very expensive, like the facades of the house, not only because of the materials invested, but also because of the amount of forces applied and the palette of emotions evoked - for all their moderation and unobtrusiveness.
Perhaps this is one of the important features of the house: a new image of luxury has been created in it: the luxury of a well-developed, finished, expensive urban space. In part, it goes to all passers-by on the street - for free, like a facade you can walk past. The house responds to the well-known reasoning that “elite” construction in the city center is usually a very expensive story. But alas, the result does not always look like a valuable box - not flashy, but confidently and calmly demonstrating its value: by the thoughtfulness and execution of the elements and the whole, the appropriateness of their appearance and, thus, the already mentioned balance, which, one must think, has been found here. That makes the house a good example of construction in the center, a good example of a new "apartment building" that meets the long list of modern requirements.
