Open letter text:
“Dear Sergey Olegovich!
I got acquainted with the publicly available images of the project of the new Yandex headquarters building and with your assessment of it, which I share. At the same time, I believe that the appearance of such a striking object in the panorama of the Palace of Pioneers requires a drastic revision of the previously adopted concept of reconstruction of buildings located in the park of the Palace. If we build here something similar to Nikolay Pereslegin's proposal, it will be a disgrace against the background of Yandex. I will also note that my own approach to the problem, proposing to construct new buildings in the style of the 60s, is also losing its relevance. Yandex carries a new spirit of the twenties of the XXI century and requires a different concept for the completion of the complex of the Palace of Pioneers. How to decide on it?
Let me briefly recall the history of the Palace project. It was designed by Mikhail Khazhakyan (Giprokommunstroy) and showed his proposal in pencil to the Moscow Architectural Council for preliminary approval. I didn't like the project. And then the chief architect of Moscow, Iosif Ignatievich Loveiko, ordered a competition with the participation of three youth teams from Mosproekt. The project, taken as a basis as a result of the competition, was implemented. I propose to hold a competition for the concept of completing the Palace complex, bearing in mind its compositional and functional content.
However, the main building of the Palace, which has the status of a cultural heritage site, requires a particularly responsible approach to the problem and we need to be sure of the successful outcome of the competition. Therefore, I propose to invite to participate in it three of the most respected by me masters of Russian architecture: Yuri Grigoryan, Vladimir Plotkin and Sergei Skuratov. And we will receive three worthy proposals.
In the first competition of the Palace, the architectural council and the presidium of the Board of the Moscow Union of Architects acted as the jury. And now you can do this. There were no awards in the 1958 competition. The winner received the right to sell. And this experience can be repeated. Then the project was done from scratch and the contestants were given a period of two months. Today we are talking about 50 percent of the territory - one month is enough. You, Sergey Olegovich, have every right to announce such a competition. I believe that the mayor of Mo-squa will not interfere with this. And you will be honored.
I would like to note that none of the three participants in the competition was present at the well-known meeting of the Moscow Committee for Architecture and Construction on March 4 and was not familiar with the project on which IV Zalivukhin and I continued to work. I consider it necessary to report our proposals to them. Of course, this does not oblige them to anything. But if any of them consider anything in it reasonable and reasonable, they can take advantage of it. It is also necessary to explain what is meant by the functional content of the complex. In its current state, it is designed for 7,000 children, and 10,000 are engaged in it. To avoid crowding in the spaces of the buildings, the Palace needs an additional 15,000 square meters. m of area and our proposal in this regard should also be familiarized to the bidders.
It should be noted that without this area, scientific restoration of the main building of the Palace is impossible, in which, due to the tightness, all the halls in the buildings of the circle work are occupied, and in the concept of Pereslegin, partitions are proposed in the main suite of the 1st building. It is unacceptable. The interiors of the Palace must be restored to their main advantage - the feeling of spaciousness. And then the children of the Gagarinsky district will not feel cramped in them.
Our restorers are masters of reviving antiquities, but they have no experience with modernist architecture. Each of the participants in the competition is well versed in it. The winner will need to patronize the design of the restoration work and the course of the restoration itself.
I have no doubt that such a competition will arouse a lively public interest and provide the best solution to all the problems of the complex. As well as the fact that my friends - the authors of the Palace - Victor Yegerev, Igor Pokrovsky, Boris Paluy, Mikhail Khazhakyan, Yuri Ionov, who earlier, who later, who have already passed away, would support my proposal. I hope Vladimir Kubasov, who recently celebrated 90, will also agree with me.
Save the Palace from architectural mediocrity!"
Author of the Palace of Pioneers
