По-русски

The Copper Mirror

The varied-toned sheen of “unsealed” copper, painterly streaks and fingerprints, exposed concrete, and the unusual proportions – when you study the ZILART Museum building by Sergei Tchoban and SPEECH architects, there is plenty to talk about. However, it seems to us that the most interesting thing is how the museum’s composition responds to the realities of the district itself. The residential district has been realized as an open-air exhibition of façade statements by contemporary architects – but without public access to the inner courtyards of the blocks. This building – that is, the museum – is exactly the opposite: on the outside, it is deliberately restrained, while inside it shines spectacularly, creating its own sunbeams in any weather.

30 December 2025
Object
mainImg
Architect:
Sergei Tchoban
Igor Chlenov
Firm:
SPEECH http://www.speech.su
We have already written about the main features of the ZILART Museum building, including thanks to an interview with Sergei Tchoban.

The building is distinguished by its carefully thought-out museum navigation and equipment – halls on separate floors that can be transformed; as well as the warm atrium space, open to everyone – a “covered city square”. What also catches the eye is the ubiquitous use of natural materials: above all, natural “unsealed” copper and exposed concrete.

zooming
ZILART Museum
Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


This alone is quite enough to mark the exceptional nature of the new museum that has appeared in Moscow. The building is an event. In early December, three exhibitions by well-known curators opened there. The exhibitions are good and diverse; each is impressive in its own way. The conclusion, reached by many, about the exceptional nature of the new museum is beyond doubt.

However, I would like to talk about the building as such.

From the outside, it is laconic. If I hadn’t been following the development of the project, I would even say “suddenly laconic”.

Why “suddenly”? Because very few new museum buildings are so modest in their outward presentation. Quite the opposite – despite the fact that from a functional point of view museums are introverted buildings (natural light is generally harmful to exhibitions), people nevertheless try to give them greater expressiveness, greater self-presentation in the surrounding space. Let us recall at least the gigantic sculpture in Bilbao; or even Sergei Tchoban’s own Museum for Architectural Drawing in Berlin, made of carved limestone, with the shifted tiers that shape its volume.

It’s not that the façades of the ZILART Museum are “simple”. They are entirely subordinated to a grid of copper strips, identical on all sides and arranged in something like a checkerboard pattern. I look at the drawings and at a photograph of the façade: the grid can be described as composed of horizontal rectangles with proportions of about 1.5 (the architects clarify: 1.55 if measured by the glass and 1.49 by the column axes), which is close to the Fibonacci sequence, but not equal to it. Each rectangle must be mentally divided into three parts – and then the middle one divided again diagonally. This produces two trapezoids laid inside the rectangle. On the upper tier, where the distance between floor slabs is greater, the rectangles turn into squares, and the diagonals take on a different angle – 72° instead of 64°.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    A branch of the State Hermitage Museum on the territory of the former ZIL plant. Project, 2021
    Copyright © SPEECH / provided by the Moskomarkhitektura press service


The facades have been done with great care; none of the “liberties” that builders sometimes allow themselves are in evidence here. On the lower tier, the glass panes are seamless, 6 meters high. Above, joints do appear, but they are rare and horizontal; the graphic pattern of the joints participates in the overall design.

Where there is no glass – that is, on most of the building – the gaps in the grid are filled with fine-ribbed surfaces (“the blind sections of the grid are filled with a “toothy” copper insert” the architects clarify – and so shall we). These no less strongly reveal the pattern of the flat strips and also – and this is important! – help to mask the ventilation grilles, which is, in my view, quite literally a “note to the architect” type of idea.

In this conditionally massive part, on the rear side, a terrace has been cut out – a recessed loggia overlooking Tyufeleva Grove.

In the recess, on the open terrace, there is an installation by Alexander Brodsky; they say it is a bar, but I have not yet managed to get onto the terrace, so I cannot say anything for certain.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


So! A very laconic, very flat cube, subordinated to a calm grid with an element of the diagonal. In reality, it is not quite a cube – in plan the building is stretched by 8%, its “axis-to-axis” dimensions are 50 m by 54 m, toward Tyufeleva Grove, and its height is noticeably less than the side of the base, 38.1 m plus one underground level – but from the outside, however you measure it, the building is perceived as an almost-cube with almost identical facades.

zooming
ZILART Museum
Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


Since the facades were completed – it seems – about a year ago, the copper on the exterior has had time to age naturally; it has turned dark brown, like most of the buildings in ZILART: calm and neutral, less bright than Sergei Skuratov’s building on Lot no. 2.

Yes, in the sunlight the grid lines shimmer just like the glass – which, for the main façade facing the boulevard, reinforces the association with a mirror reflecting everything around it. And then you recall that in antiquity all mirrors were made of polished copper or bronze. So you might conclude that the combination of a copper frame and the reflections in the glass highlights the building’s very function as a museum – presenting it as a place where authentic objects are stored and at the same time as a reflection of reality.

So what we get is a kind of copper cube, a contemporary version of an ancient mirror…

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


However, the architects reject the dimensions, metaphors, and comparisons listed above – which is their right – and clarify: “this cube is not about calculations, not about millimeters and degrees. It is homage to the mechanisms that used to be here back when the factory operated. A kind of machine for art”.

That’s also a good allusion. You can take your pick, which you like best. Besides, the theme of a “machine for art” nicely underlines the sophisticated technology behind a modern museum building. In my view, it’s more a machine for displaying and storing art on the inside; the exterior only hints at it. But why not? It’s good when a laconic form can be read in different ways.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


So, the museum cube in itself – I repeat – is laconic and introverted.

However, once we step inside – everything changes radically. It becomes clear that the ribbons are not flat at all, but quite volumetric, square in section; that the grid is real, structural, and “carries” the entire 35-meter-high atrium. When you sit inside, say at a presentation, you can’t help but compare it to a Faraday cage, because it’s made of copper.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


And then you start wondering whether a mobile signal gets through. I checked. Not always.

It’s not about the signal, however – you may not even need one inside a museum, although many exhibitions now use QR codes for additional information…

No, it’s not about the signal. It’s about the fact that the more restrained the building is on the outside, the more festive it becomes inside. Some kind of feeling of pure joy arises in there. The red copper shines and shimmers, and even on a gloomy day, partly thanks to the lighting and partly by itself, it “accumulates” “sunny” reflections in the atrium space. It lifts your spirits.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


Being inside copper walls in itself creates a very peculiar impression. As already mentioned, the material is entirely natural, but unusual. With its slightly golden glow, it creates a sense of preciousness better than any multicolored marbles. And even better than modern “gilding”, which in many cases isn’t real and therefore looks too bright.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


Here the copper has the right shade; and don’t tell me it’s going to age. Yes, you can already see fingerprints left during installation – they’ve darkened, as have the fingerprints of the first visitors on the lower levels. But everything higher up, one would assume, will go on shining for a long time, enlivened by spontaneous markings, showing the attentive observer the whole “range” of variations between oxidized and clean, bright surfaces.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


The door leaves leading into the galleries have turned out even better. The ceilings are 5 meters high, and the doors are big – five meters as well – and to open them you have to lean in with your whole body, which once again makes you feel the serious, monumental nature of a museum.

The doors are copper. A bright, painterly strip runs across them – as if executed in some unknown etching/watercolor technique. I think architects who are curious would do well to ask the SPEECH specialists how it came about. Whatever the answer, in my view the strip excellently distinguishes the doors within the interiors, on both sides, emphasizing them as entrances.

The color is very beautiful, and I wouldn’t be surprised if, after some time, our whole cultural scene begins to experiment with it.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


Everything else, including the concrete, remains in the background and, as is customary in good contemporary spaces, creates an interior atmosphere that is not overly bright or glossy, leaving you free to breathe.

But I also want to say a few words about the concrete. Right now the so-called exposed or “architectural” concrete is very popular with many people: smooth, polished, in some ways descending from the artificial marble of classicism. It is characterized by a very even surface and by the round marks from the formwork – for example, Tadao Ando uses this at Punta della Dogana. It is also used in many other places. Well, to my taste, this kind of “arch-concrete”, which has been popular for the last 20 years, has grown commonplace. There is no naturalness in it, and too much rhythm. “Living” concrete is far more interesting.

zooming
ZILART Museum
Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


And that is exactly the kind that has been used here.

One can certainly argue about how evenly “natural” concrete should be poured in order to be left exposed. However, for a cultural space – even a newly built one – this kind of surface, in our 2020s, has a sort of “retroactive force”: it recalls the concrete of art clusters set up in industrial zones, sometimes in post-war factory halls, where exposed concrete is common. The open surface of concrete has become a kind of identifying mark of a creative space, and I think it is fair to say that this feature has been taken into account in Sergei Tсhoban’s ZILART Museum.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


Another feature is the supports – fairly widely spaced and not burdened with excessive thickness, since the building isn’t very tall, only 37 meters. They are square, which is consistent with the deliberately rough character of the space, but they are not large.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


For me personally, it’s more difficult to decide how appropriate the appearance of graffiti in the atrium is. On the one hand, this enlivens the copper composition, adds color, and gives the eye something to rest on.

On the other hand, the graffiti works as a meaningful “reference point”, emphasizing the intermediate status of the atrium space – somewhere between inside and outside. And besides, it functions as a public, ticket-free, urban space open to everyone. Graffiti is characteristic of the city, and in this case they “represent” it inside the museum, as if telling the visitor that they are simultaneously in the museum and in the city. The artists chosen are the best-known masters.

  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH
  • zooming
    ZILART Museum
    Copyright: Photograph © Andrey Belimov-Gushchin / provided by SPEECH


All of this is true.

But a couple of doubts creep in. First of all, of course, these are not graffiti but murals. Graffiti belongs more to the realm of writing, usually unauthorized; murals, on the contrary, are typically figurative and approved. In Moscow and other cities in our country, authorized murals have become widespread over the last ten years. Clearly, genuine graffiti would hardly be possible within the museum walls – we recall the story of the Banksy work that shredded itself after being sold at auction… And I also remember a meme I recently saw on Telegram, where to the Ten Commandments carved on stone a new one was added: “Thou shalt not receive approvals for street art”.

These are, of course, extremes. But you can’t get such things out of your head.

One might say that the presence of murals reflects Moscow’s recent tendency to “receive approvals for street art”. In that case, this would even become a relevant statement about contemporary art in our city – art that has perched right on the boundary between the urban realm and collecting, in very close proximity to the latter.

Back to the museum building, however! It turns out that it is very restrained on the outside – a kind of little cube. Inside, in the atrium, it is bright, striking, golden, and sunlit. And then again neutral in the actual exhibition halls. There are three layers in total.



And if we look at the whole of ZILART from above as a kind of “motherboard”, the museum on it would be the processor: an inconspicuous little square which nevertheless plays a key role, with something always “buzzing” inside it, as – let’s say – in the museum atrium, some kilobytes continually rushing around. And the neighboring “Pineapple House” by Neutelings Riedijk, for example, would be a transistor… Here one recalls Rem Koolhaas’s master plan for Skolkovo, which also resembled a motherboard; and indeed, the northeastern part of ZILART is somewhat similar to it. It has accumulated a number of imposing, large, abstract statements. The museum is one of them, along with the rusty centipede by Jerry van Eyck in Tyufeleva Grove.

However, if we speak about the museum building itself, it seems to have another feature – it responds to the approach implemented in the ZILART residential quarters, but in reverse, inside-out. Which is, after all, just what one expects from contemporary art! And the museum plans to collect contemporary art. As well as archaic art, and post-war art as well.



So! ZILART is a special project; beginning with the 2012 competition, it has been not only very large, but also concept-driven. An important – not to say key – center of this concept was to be the museum, a citywide point of attraction. The residential development is built on two basic principles: these are perimeter blocks with private courtyards, whose façades were designed by well-known, specially invited architects. It was not at all easy for them to maintain a balance between self-expression and delicacy – but that is another story for now. ZILART as part of the city is also a kind of museum, a museum of statements by contemporary architects, in the open air.

It is impossible for an outsider to get inside each block’s “little cube”, but one can walk around them, studying the facades, remembering the authorship, and comparing.

Faced with such an open-air exhibition, the museum building could compete in two ways: it could try to “outshout” – and, as we know, such an attempt was indeed proposed. Or it could choose a deliberately neutral, restrained image. And that is exactly what Sergei Tchoban did. His museum is built according to a principle that is the reverse of a ZILART block. The block is closed inside; most city dwellers have no idea what is there; the block is “silent” within. The museum, on the other hand, is restrained on the outside – but bright on the inside. Why? Because inside it is, in fact, open to everyone – that’s one reason – and most importantly, the exhibits, the exhibitions, are also inside. A logical and fresh solution.

Architect:
Sergei Tchoban
Igor Chlenov
Firm:
SPEECH http://www.speech.su

30 December 2025

Headlines now
Object
The Copper Mirror
The varied-toned sheen of “unsealed” copper, painterly streaks and fingerprints, exposed concrete, and the unusual proportions – when you study the ZILART Museum building by Sergei Tchoban and SPEECH architects, there is plenty to talk about. However, it seems to us that the most interesting thing is how the museum’s composition responds to the realities of the district itself. The residential district has been realized as an open-air exhibition of façade statements by contemporary architects – but without public access to the inner courtyards of the blocks. This building – that is, the museum – is exactly the opposite: on the outside, it is deliberately restrained, while inside it shines spectacularly, creating its own sunbeams in any weather.
View
“Strangers” in the City
We asked Alexander Skokan for a comment on the results of 2025 – and he sent us a whole article, moreover one devoted to the discussion we recently began on the “appropriateness of high-rises” – or, more broadly speaking, “contrasting insertions into the urban fabric”. The result is a text that is essentially a question: why here? Why like this?
Interview
Dmitry Ostroumov: “To use the language of alchemy, we are involved in the process of “transmutation...
What we ended up having was an extremely unusual conversation with Dmitry Ostroumov. Why? At the very least, because he is not just an architect specializing in the construction of Orthodox churches. And not just – which is an extreme rarity – a proponent of developing contemporary stylistics within this still highly conservative field. Dmitry Ostroumov is a Master of Theology. So in addition to the history and specifics of the company, we speak about the very concept of the temple, about canon and tradition, about the living and the eternal, and even about the Russian Logos.
Object
A Glazed Figurine
In searching for an image for a residential building near the Novodevichy Convent, GAFA architects turned to their own perception of the place: it evoked associations with antiquity, plein-air painting, and vintage artifacts. The two towers will be entirely clad in volumetric glazed ceramic – at present, there are no other buildings like this in Russia. The complex will also stand out thanks to its metabolic bay-window cells, streamlined surfaces, a ceremonial “hotel-style” driveway, and a lobby overlooking a lush garden.
Report
A Knight’s Move via the Cour d’Honneur
Intercolumnium Architects presented to the City Planning Council a residential complex project that is set to replace the Aquatoria business center on Vyborgskaya Embankment. Experts praised the overall quality of the work, but expressed reservations about the three cour d’honneurs and suggested softening the contrast between the facades facing the embankment and the Kantemirovsky Bridge.
Object
A Small Country
Mezonproekt is developing a long-term master plan for the MEPhI campus in Obninsk. Over the next ten years, an enclave territory of about 100 hectares, located in a forest on the northern edge of the city, is set to transform into a modern center for the development of the nuclear energy sector. The plan envisions attracting international students and specialists, as well as comprehensive territorial development: both through the contemporary realization of “frozen” plans from the 1980s and through the introduction of new trends – public spaces, an aquapark, a food court, a school, and even a nuclear medicine center. Public and sports facilities are intended to be accessible to city residents as well, and the campus is to be physically and functionally connected to Obninsk.
Object
Pearl Divers
GAFA has designed an apartment complex for Derbent intended to switch people from a work mode to a resort mindset – and to give the surrounding area a much-needed jolt. The building offers two distinct faces: restrained and laconic on the city side, and a lushly ornate façade facing the sea. At the heart of the complex, a hidden pearl lies – an open-air pool with an arch, offering views of a starry sky, and providing direct access to the beach.
Object
A Satellite Island
The Genplan Institute of Moscow has prepared a master plan for the development of the Sarpinsky and Golodny island system, located within the administrative boundaries of Volgograd and considered among the largest river islands in Russia. By 2045, the plan envisions the implementation of 15 large-scale investment projects, including sports and educational clusters, a congress center with a “Volgonarium”, a film production cluster, and twenty-one theme parks. We explain which engineering, environmental, and transportation challenges must be addressed to turn this vision into reality. The master plan solutions have already been approved and incorporated into the city’s general development plan.
Object
The Amber Gate
The Amber City residential complex is one of the redevelopment projects in the former industrial area located beyond Moscow’s Third Ring Road near Begovaya metro station. Alexey Ilyin’s studio proposed an original master plan that transformed two clusters of towers into ceremonial propylaea, gave the complex a recognizable silhouette, and established visual connections with new high-rise developments on both right and left – thus integrating it into the scale of the growing metropolis. It is also marked by its own futuristic stylistic language, based on a reinterpreted streamline aesthetic.
Object
A Theater Triangle
The architectural company “Chetvertoe Izmerenie” (“Fourth Dimension”) has developed the design for a new stage of the Magnitogorsk Musical Theater, rethinking not only theater architecture but also the role of the theater in the contemporary city.
Interview
Aleksei Ilyin: “I approach every task with genuine interest”
Aleksei Ilyin has been working on major urban projects for more than 30 years. He has all the necessary skills for high-rise construction in Moscow – yet he believes it’s essential to maintain variety in the typologies and scales represented in his portfolio. He is passionate about drawing – but only from life, and also in the process of working on a project. We talk about the structure and optimal size of an office, about his past and current projects, large and small tasks, and about creative priorities.
Object
​A Golden Sunbeam
A compact brick-and-metal building in the growing Shukhov Park in Vyksa seems to absorb sunlight, transform it into yellow accents inside, and in the evening “give it back” as a warm golden glow streaming from its windows. It is, frankly, a very attractive building: both material and lightweight at the same time, with lightness inside and materiality outside. Its form is shaped by function – laconic, yet far from simple. Let’s take a closer look.
Architecton Awards
In 2025, the jury of the Architecton festival reviewed the finalist projects through live, open presentations held right in the exhibition hall – a rather engaging performance, and something rarely seen among Russian awards. It would be great if “Zodchestvo” adopted this format. Below, we present all the winning projects, including four special nominations.
send.project
Garden of Knowledge
UNK architects and UNK design created the interiors of the Letovo Junior campus, working together with NF Studio, which was responsible for developing the educational technology that takes into account the needs and perception of younger and middle school children.
The Silver Skates
The STONE Kaluzhskaya office quarter is accompanied by two residential towers, making the complex – for it is indeed a single ensemble – well balanced in functional terms. The architects at Kleinewelt gave the residential buildings a silvery finish to match the office blocks. How they are similar, how they differ, and what “Silver Skates” has to do with it – we explore in this article.
Overview
On the Dynastic Trail
The houses and townhouses of the “Tsarskaya Tropа” (“Czar’s Trail”) complex are being built in the village of Gaspra in Crimea – to the west and east of the palaces of the former grand-ducal residence “Ai-Todor”. One of the main challenges for the architects at KPLN, who developed the project, was to respond appropriately to this significant neighboring heritage. How this influenced the massing, the façades, and the way the authors work with the terrain is explored in our article.
Object
A New Path
The main feature of the Yar Park project, designed by Sergey Skuratov for Kazan, is that it is organized along the “spine” of a multifunctional mall with an impressive multi-height atrium space in its middle. The entire site, both on the city side and the Kazanka River embankment, is open to the public. The complex is intended not to become “yet another fenced enclave” but, as urban planners say, a “polycenter” – a new point of attraction for the whole of Kazan, especially its northern part, made up of residential districts that until now have lacked such a vibrant public space. It represents a new urban planning approach to a high-density mixed-use development situated in the city center – in a sense, an “anti-quarter”. Even Moscow, one might say, doesn’t yet have anything quite like it. Well, lucky Kazan!
Object
Beneath the Azure Sky
A depository designed by Studio 44 will soon be built in Kenozersky National Park to preserve and display the so-called “heavens” – ceiling structures characteristic of wooden churches in the Russian North, painted with biblical scenes. For each of these “heavens”, the architects created a volume corresponding in scale and dimensions to the original church interior. The result is a honeycomb-like composition, with modules derived directly from the historic monuments themselves, allowing visitors to view the icons from the historically accurate angle – from below, looking upward. How exactly this works is the subject of our story.
Object
​The Power of Lines
The building at the very beginning of New Arbat is the result of long deliberations over how to replace the former House of Communication. Contemporary, dynamic, and even somewhat zoomorphic in character, it is structured around a large diagonal grid. The building has become a striking accent both in the perspective of the former Kalinin Avenue and in the panorama of Arbat Square. Yet, unfortunately, the original concept was not fully realized. In 2020, the Moscow ArchCouncil approved a design featuring an exoskeleton – an external load-bearing structure, which eventually turned into a purely decorative element. Still, the power of the supergraphic “holds” the building, giving it the qualities of a new urban landmark with iconic potential. How this concept took shape, what unexpected associations might underlie the grid’s form, and why the exoskeleton was never built – all this is explored in our article.
News
Resort on the Kama River
Wowhaus has developed a project for the reconstruction of Korabelnaya Roshcha (“Mast Grove”), a wellness resort located on the banks of the Kama River.
Object
Nests in Primorye
The eco-park project “Nests”, designed by Aleksey Polishchuk and the company Power Technologies, received first prize at the Eco-Coast 2025 festival, organized by the Union of Architects of Russia. For a glamping site in Filinskaya Bay, the authors proposed bird-shaped houses, treehouses, and a nest-shaped observation platform, topping it all with an entrance pavilion executed in the shape of an owl.
Object
The Angle of String Tension
The House of Music, designed by Vladimir Plotkin and the architects of TPO Reserve, resembles a harp, and when seen from above, even a bass clef. But if only it were that simple! The architecture of the complex fuses two distinct expressive languages: the lattice-like, transparent, permeable vocabulary of “classical” modernism and the sculptural, ribbon-like volumes so beloved by today’s neo-modernism. How it all works – where the catharsis lies, which compositional axes underpin the design, where the project resembles Zaryadye Concert Hall and where it does not – read in the article below.
Object
How Historic Tobolsk Becomes a Portal to the Future
Over the past decade, the architectural company Wowhaus has developed urban strategies for several Russian cities – Vyksa, Tula, and Nizhnekamsk, to name but a few. Against this backdrop, the Tobolsk master plan stands out both for its scale – the territory under transformation covers more than 220 square kilometers – and for its complexity.
Object
St. Petersburg vs Rome
The center of St. Petersburg is, as we know, sacred – but few people can say with certainty where this “sacred place” actually begins and ends. It’s not about the formal boundaries, “from the Obvodny Canal to the Bolshaya Nevka”, but about the vibe that feels true to the city center. With the Nevskaya Ratusha complex – built to a design that won an international competition – Evgeny Gerasimov and Sergei Tchoban created an “image of the center” within its territory. And not so much the image of St. Petersburg itself, as that of a global metropolis. This is something new, something that hasn’t appeared in the city for a long time. In this article, we study the atmosphere, recall precedents, and even reflect on who and when first called St. Petersburg the “new Rome”. Clearly, the idea is alive for a reason.
Object
On the Wave
The project of transforming the river port and embankment in the city of Cheboksary, developed by the ATRIUM Architects, involves one of the city’s key areas. The Volga embankment is to be turned into a riverside boulevard – a multifunctional, comfortable, and expressive space for work and leisure activities. The authors propose creating a new link with the city’s main Krasnaya (“Red”) Square, as well as erecting several residential towers inspired by the shape of the traditional national women’s headdress – these towers are likely to become striking accents on the Volga panorama.
Interview
Valery Kanyashin: “We Were Given a Free Hand”
The Headliner residential complex, the main part of which was recently completed just across from Moscow City, is a kind of neighbor to the MIBC that doesn’t “play along” with it. On the contrary, the new complex is entirely built on contrast: like a city of differently scaled buildings that seems to have emerged naturally over the past 20 years – which is a hugely popular trend nowadays! And yet here – perhaps only here – such a project has been realized to its full potential. Yes, high-rises dominate, but all these slender, delicate profiles, all these exciting perspectives! And most importantly – how everything is mixed and composed together... We spoke with the project’s leader Valery Kanyashin.
Object
​The Keystone
Until quite recently, premium residential and office complexes in Moscow were seen as the exclusive privilege of the city center. Today the situation is changing: high-quality architecture is moving beyond the confines of the Third Ring Road and appearing on the outskirts. The STONE Kaluzhskaya business center is one such example. Projects like this help decentralize the megalopolis, making life and work prestigious in any part of the city.
send.project
Perpetuum Mobile
The interior of the headquarters of Natsproektstroy, created by the IND studio team, vividly and effectively reflects the client’s field of activity – it is one of Russia’s largest infrastructure companies, responsible for logistics and transport communications of every kind you can possibly think of.