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The Fifth Element

The high-end residential development in the Vsevolozhsky Lane features a combination of expensive stone and metal textures, immersing them into a feast of ornaments. The house looks like a fantasy inspired by the theater of the Art Nouveau and Symbolism era; a kind of oriental fairy tale, which paradoxically allows it to avoid direct stylization and become a reflection of one of the aspects of modern Moscow life.

Julia Tarabarina

Written by:
Julia Tarabarina
Translated by:
Anton Mizonov

03 February 2021
Object
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We already wrote about the project of the high-end residential complex in Ostozhenka’s Vsevolozhsky Lane back in 2016. The house is situated in the beginning of the “Golden Mile”, a five minutes’ walk away from Kropotkinskaya metro station, in the stead of a Soviet telephone hub built back in the 1980’s. Height- and redline-wise, it responds to the surrounding historical context; left and right of it, there are two tenements, designed by the architect Nikolai Zherikhov in the beginning of the 1910’s, one of them being an impressive neo-classic, the other, on the side street, unassuming Art Nouveau. Both neighbors are separated from the house by driveways, unlike the Soviet telephone station, which was pushed up against their firewalls. New caesuras in the continuous construction front opened the way for the rays of the sun, which shines from the south, from the side of the courtyard; they also let more light into the alley – the authors of the project explain.



Image-wise, however, the house does not directly respond to any of the neighboring buildings or the houses across the street, but develops its own theme based on accentuated ornaments on the verge of Art Nouveau and Art Deco, yet with some modern amalgamation, freedom of interpretation and geometrization of all of its elements. The market of Moscow high-end residential construction requires, on the one hand, a design solution that looks obviously expensive, based on costly materials, and carefully drawn, and, on the other hand, it must be something unique and unparalleled. Admittedly, the house in the Vsevolozhsky Lane meets both criteria. The facades are very rich, their main textures being natural limestone and metal (glass fiber concrete with a surface imitating patinated bronze). But, more importantly, Moscow has not yet seen anything like it.



Generally, the house retains a rather conservative layout and typology: its plan has a U shape with two stairway risalits from the yard sides; in the center, the street is overlooked by an imposing entrance portal with a deep double-height lobby behind it. On either side of it, there are faceted verticals of the bay windows. The top tier above their ledges features the recessed balconies of the penthouse underneath massive canopies with skylights looking like large caissons.



The structure, we repeat, is traditional, yet every element within it is enhanced a little bit more than usual. The bay windows form a faceted wave; the top recessed balconies, as if offsetting them, are deep and spacious, the entrance portal is really large. In addition, “metallic” structures are really numerous: combined with glass and stone, they form a weaving akin to jewelry, of course, adjusted for repeated enlargement.





This ornamental weaving became the fundamental technique that creates the impression of this house being special. There are virtually no empty planes on the main facade, and all the elements, even those in which the order-architecture base can be traced, are subjugated to the general “carpet” decorativeness. For example, the piers between the bay windows are likened to fluted pilasters, but they have neither bases nor capitals, apart from the “secession” metallic stripes at the top. The stone verticals may equally seem to be flutes or the wall surface’s response to the shape of the bay windows, because their relief consists of three-faceted ledges, and not of traditional grooves.



The rock-face surface here receives beveled contours, forming a perspective illusion in the walls between the windows – a false ledge akin to the finds of the Pompeian style. The keystones do not crown the arches and do not form cornices, but only serve as decorative “crowns”, being placed closer to the base part. The curbs everywhere are huge, made of stone and bronze, significantly larger than their order prototypes, and work to enhance the light and shade.



Probably, the most traditional element here is the bronze diamond cut of the bindings of the triple windows; it also enhances associations with the Pompeian style and Art Deco.



Everything that cannot be explained in one way or another from the point of view of the architecture of orders is subordinate to the ornament, which can be conventionally divided into two types: surfaces completely covered with curls very much in the spirit of Gustav Klimt – and a pattern composed of zigzags and slanted plates, each of which peeps out from under the next one. They look like “hollow relief” (or “cavo relievo” the kind of relief that is based on voids rather than protrusions, a technique first used in Ancient Egypt), depicting growing crystals. What is also curious is the fact that the large ornament responds to the spatial pattern of specks of light on the skirting boards of the staircases in the sunlight.



Another important detail is that the “lamellar” relief covers not just the front surfaces: the relief decoration of the house is applied everywhere and covers, among other things, the lower planes of the bay windows, so a passer-by, raising his head, will also see an ornament. “It was essential for us to treat the surface of the house as processed and dynamic, revealing the depth of the stone surface” – emphasizes the leader of AB “Mezonproekt” Ilia Mashkov.



Sometimes, the lamellar pattern “merges” with the curls, the scrolls becoming larger in these instances, and their contour freer. Between stone and bronze, the “layered crystals” are roughly halved – they are present here and there, responsible for the integrity of the approach and the connection between the two main materials of the façade.

Essentially, they keep the entire house together. All the patterns respond to the joints between stone and bronze plates, in many cases including them into the general rhythm as its quite natural part – it may seem that the house is being formed before our eyes from individual “scales”, thus making full use of the modern technology of interaction between the ventilation facade and its cladding.



The relief motifs are continued in the patterns of bronze lattices – on the ledges of the bay windows they are looser and more abstract and geometric, figurative sunflowers appearing in the planar verticals, designed in a more traditional way.

But then again, figurative can also be traced in the basic motive of the bay windows – generalized human figures, the circle of which forms the sun in the house logo proposed by the architects.



The circle is meant to symbolize the community of residents, while the conditional “origami” shadows, which can be seen almost everywhere on the facades, albeit in a coded state, serve as the reminder of the main idea. The outline of the “human figure”, dissected very much like a pentagram, is even slightly reminiscent of the outline of Le Corbusier’s “Modulor”, which suddenly redirects us from the conditional “secession” to the architectural search of more recent times.



A denser and more detailed version of the ornament is continued in the copper panels above the entrance and in the lobby – here, closer to the entrance, real metal is used. The gradient shades of its precious “red” color are well read thanks to the close “brocade” weaving of multidirectional curls, working to create an image of an expensive “frame” or “lining” of the house.



The yard façade is more laconically designed: on the one hand, this is dictated by the logic of the rear façade itself, on the other, there are more large ledges and projections here, which makes the structure of volumes resonate with the neighboring houses and is thus perceived as a contextually meaningful part of the “Moscow yard”.



Here the cutting of the stone slabs takes on a noticeable resemblance to a rock-face surface, and, unlike the main façade, “synthesized” by ornaments, here the decorated and laconic surfaces are rather contrastive to each other. At the same time, the large-scale frames around the staircase risalits continue the theme set by the entrance portal, giving the house quite a solemn appearance: even from the yard side it looks “like a palace”. Maybe even some oriental, even Persian palace – first of all due to the neoclassical character of the dual composition with a pier in the center.



The central pier is there on the main façade as well, where it is a little less prominent. Its appearance is conditioned by the structure of the house, consisting of two sections with one entrance in the middle.



However, the main effect that this house produces is the theatrical one. The Art Nouveau and neo classical buildings, standing near, vividly demonstrate that this house is not stylization and not historicism in the direct sense of this word, and not even another experience with bourgeois Art Deco. Most of all, it resembles the illustrations and scenography of the Symbolists, sketches of costumes and backstage; a curtain for some “Egyptian Nights”. The fantasy component is very strong here – trying to embellish the façade surface, the architects are emphasizing its role as some sort of a screen, upon which you can draw in a freehand manner. We will note here that this approach makes the house look like more than just a modern one: this version of craving for sensations which makes you turn the surroundings into a theater stage and provokes some pretty loose attitude towards the rules, so visible in houses that are more than a hundred years old, is specifically characteristic of this day and age. It is this approach that opposes the rules with what I would call “materiality riot” – if not in color, then in lines and textures, and ledges and recessions.



If we are to compare this house with earlier houses designed by Mezonproekt in the spirit of respectable historicism – for example, the housing complex “House near Academy of Sciences” or with the house on Veresaeva Street – we will see a much freer construction, to some extent based on independence of the ornaments with a tendency to self-development. Although the house looks “Egyptian”, it does not have, strictly speaking, a single recognizable Egyptian detail about it, neither lotus, nor scarab (even though the wings, open wide in a “scarab” fashion over the central pier on the yard façade, do evoke some certain associations). The scrolls on the walls look more like the wigs and the beards of the winged Assyrian oxen from the Pushkin Museum. This house is not a stylization – rather, it is a fantasy inspired by the fantasies of the Symbolists, who in turn were inspired by an oriental tale: radiant, desperately luxurious, in many ways deliberately mysterious – the sum of those emotions that often evoke in us the most generalized idea of “the Golden Age” interrupted by the First World War. To be exact, that time is adequately termed “Silver Age” – but many people tend to think of it as the “Golden Age”, some sort of lost paradise, some sort of candy fairytale. Probably, this is the kind of fairytale that the house in Vsevolozhsky Alley must become. Well, then, it is a really understandable in the Moscow context experiments with feelings – both resident’s and passers-by.
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing complex “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”. Plan of the 1st floor
    Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt
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    “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”. Plan of the ground floor
    Copyright © Mezonproekt
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    “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”. Plan of the typical floor © Mezonproject
    Copyright © Mezonproekt
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    “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”. Master plan
    Copyright © Mezonproekt
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    “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”. Section view
    Copyright © Mezonproekt
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    “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”. Section view
    Copyright © Mezonproekt
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    “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”. Fragment of the facade with a section view
    © Mezonproject
High-end housing project “Residence in Vsevolozhsky”
Copyright: Photograph © Dmitry Yagovkin / provided by Mezonproekt


03 February 2021

Julia Tarabarina

Written by:

Julia Tarabarina
Translated by:
Anton Mizonov
Headlines now
​Streamline for City Canyons
Stepan Liphart has designed two houses for two small land sites situated in the area surrounding the Varshavsky Railway Station, which is being intensively developed now. The sites are situated close but not next to each other, and they are different, yet similar: the theme is the same but it is interpreted in different ways. In this issue, we are examining and comparing both projects.
​The Eastern Frontier
“The Eastern Arc” is one of the main land resources of Kazan’s development, concentrated in the hands of a single owner. The Genplan Institute of Moscow has developed a concept for the integrated development of this territory based on an analytical transport model that will create a comfortable living environment, new centers of attraction, and new workplaces as well.
A School of Our Time
On the eve of the presentation of the new book by ATRIUM, dedicated to the design of schools and other educational facilities, based on the architects’ considerable experience, as well as expert judgments, we are examining the Quantum STEM school building, constructed according to their project in Astana. Furthermore, this building is planned to be the first one to start a new chain. The architects designed it in full accordance with modern standards but sometimes they did break away from them – only to confirm the general development rules. For example, there are two amphitheaters in the atrium, and there is an artificial hill in the yard that is meant to make the flat terrain of the Kazakhstan steppe more eventful.
The Fluffy Space
Designing the passenger terminal of the Orenburg airport, ASADOV architects continue to explore the space theme that they first introduced in Saratov and Kemerovo airports. At the same time, the architects again combine the global and the local, reflecting topics inspired by the local conceptual context. In this case, the building is “covered” by an Orenburg downy shawl – an analogy that is recognizable enough, yet not literal; some will see the reference and some won’t.
The White Fitness Center
The white health and fitness center, designed by Futura Architects at the entrance to St. Petersburg’s New Piter residential complex, provides the developing area not only with functional but also with sculptural diversity, livening up the rows of the brick city blocks with the whiteness of its seamless facades, cantilevered structures, and dynamic inclined lines.
The New Dawn
In their project of a technology park to be built on the grounds of “Integrated Home-Building Factory 500” in Tyumen Oblast – the biggest in Russia – the HADAA architects preserve not just the industrial function of the giant hangar built in the late 1980s and 90% of its structures, but also respond to its imagery. They also propose a “gradient” approach to developing the available areas: from open public ones to staff-only professional spaces. The goal of this approach is to turn the technology park into the driver for developing the business function between the industrial zones and the future residential area in accordance with the Integrated Land Development program.
​Tame Hills for New Residents
T+T Architects have reported that they have completed the landscaping project for the yard of the first stage of Alexandrovsky Garden housing complex in Ekaterinburg – the landscape complements the contextual architecture, tailored for the buyers’ preferences and downtown standards, with bold neo modernist master strokes and lush and diverse vegetation.
The Crystal of the City Block
The typology and plastique of large housing complexes move with the times, and you can sometimes find new subtleties in the scope of seemingly familiar solutions. The Sky Garden complex combines two well-known themes, forming a giant residential area consisting of tall slender towers, placed at the perimeter of a large yard, in which a crossroads of two pedestrian promenades is “dissolved”.
Sunshine, Air, and Water
The construction of the “Solnechny” (“Sunny”) summer camp, designed by ARENA project institute, has been completed, the largest summer camp within the legendary Artek seaside resort for children. It was conceived still in Soviet time, but it was not implemented. The modern version surprises you with sophisticated engineering solutions that are combined with a clear-cut structure: together, they generate Asher-esque spaces.
​Art Deco at the Edge of Space
The competition project by Stepan Liphart – a high-end residential complex executed in a reserved classicist style in close proximity to the Kaluga Space Museum – responds equally well to the context and to the client’s brief. It is moderately respectable, moderately mobile and transparent, and it even digs a little into the ground to comply with strict height restrictions, without losing proportions and scale.
Going, Going, Gone!
The housing complex “Composers’ Residences” has been built in accordance with the project by Sergey Skuratov, who won the international competition back in 2011. It all began from the image search and “cutting off all spare”, and then implementing the recognizable Skuratov architecture. It all ended, however, in tearing down the buildings of the Schlichterman factory, whose conservation was stipulated by all the appropriate agencies prior to approving Skuratov’s project. This story seems to be educational and important for understanding the history of all the eleven years, during which the complex was designed and built.
The Life of Iron
The building of the Vyksa Metallurgy Museum, designed by Nikita Yavein and Sergey Padalko, provides for the natural aging of metal – it is planned that the iron will gradually rust – at the same time utilizing the advanced type of construction, based on metal’s ability to stretch. The building will be constructed from pipes and rolled steel supplied by OMK company, as well as from recycled bricks.
​And the Brook is Flowing
ASADOV Architects have designed a master plan for developing a residential area at the outskirts of Kaliningrad: a regular grid of housing blocks is enriched by large-scale public facilities, the main “artery” of the new area being the fortification channel that regains its original function.
Off We Go!
The new terminal of the Tomsk airport is being designed by ASADOV bureau. The architects keep on developing its identity, building the imagery upon the inventions of Nikolai Kamov, whose name the airport bears. The result is laconic, light, and, as always, levitating.
Maximum Flexibility
The Multispace Dinamo, which recently opened within the Arena business center, is an example of a project that is entirely based upon cutting-edge approaches and technologies. It is managed via a mobile application, special software was created for it, and the spaces are not just multifunctional but carefully mixed up, like some kind of jigsaw puzzle that allows the office workers to mix their working routine for better efficiency.
A Factory’s Path
Last week, the new center for constructivist studies “Zotov” hosted its first exhibition named “1922. Constructivism. The Inception”. The idea of creating this center belongs to Sergey Tchoban, while the project of the nearest houses and adjusting the building of the bread factory for the new museum function was done by the architect in collaboration with his colleagues from SPEECH. We decided that such a complex project should be examined in its entirety – and this is how we came up with this long-read about constructivism on Presnya, conservation, innovation, multilayered approach, and hope.
The Savelovsky Axis
The business center, situated right in the middle of a large city junction next to the Savelovsky Railway Station takes on the role of a spatial axis, upon which the entire place hinges: it spins like a spiral, alternating perfect glass of the tiers and deep recessions of inter-tier floors that conceal little windows invented by the architects. It is sculptural, and it claims the role of a new city landmark, in spite of its relatively small height of nine floors.
Parametric Waves
In the housing complex Sydney City, which FSK Group is building in the area of Shelepikhinskaya Embankment, Genpro designed the central city block, combining parametric facades and modular technology within its architecture.
The Multitone
The new interior of the Action Development headquarters can be regarded as an attempt to design the perfect “home” for the company – not just comfortable but broadcasting the values of modern development. It responds to the context, yet it is built on contrast, it is fresh but cozy, it is dynamic, yet it invites you to relax – everything of this coexists here quite harmoniously, probably because the architects found an appropriate place for each of the themes.
Refinement No Longer Relevant
A few days ago journalists were shown the building of Bread Factory #5, renovated upon the project by Sergey Tchoban. In this issue, we are publishing Grigory Revzin’s thoughts about this project.
The Comb of Strelna
In this issue, we are taking a close look at the project that won the “Crystal Daedalus” award – the “Veren Village” housing complex in Strelna, designed by Ostozhenka. Its low-rise format became a trigger for typological and morphological experiments – seemingly, we are seeing recognizable trends, yet at the same time there are a multitude of subtleties that are a pleasure to go into. Having studied this project in detail, we think that the award is well-deserved.
A Tectonic Shift
For several years now, Futura Architects have been working with the “New Peter” residential area in the south of St. Petersburg. In this article, we are covering their most recent project – a house, in which the architects’ architectural ideas peacefully coexist with the limitations of comfort-class housing, producing a “multilayered” effect that looks very attractive for this typology.
Three “Green” Stories
In this issue, we are examining three environmental urban projects showcased by the Genplan Institute of Moscow at the Zodchestvo festival. The scale of the projects is really diverse: from gathering information and suggestions from the residents on a city scale to growing meadow grass between houses to paintings, which, as it turned out, possess power to cure trees, healing their wounded bark. + a list of kinds of plants natural for Moscow to help the developer.
​The Slabs of Bagration
The construction of a new skyscraper designed by SPEECH within the complex of Moscow City has been announced. A keen observer may see in it: Moscow high-rises, Chicago architecture, Malevich architecton, and an attempt of deconstruction of the integral image of the Moscow skyscraper – a technique that has been actively employed by the architects in their recent works.
​Preserving the History of Clean Ponds
How do you make a comfortable high-end residential complex that meets the modern requirements for expensive downtown housing, and keep as much of the original 1915 building as possible? Ilia Utkin, together with Sminex, solved this charade for Potapovsky Lane, 5 – here is how.
​Living in a Forest
The apartment complex in Roshchino, designed by GAFA architects, looks very much like a glamping: the residents enjoy the untouched nature of the Karelian isthmus, while having urban amenities and opportunities for social life.
A Laboratory for Life
The building of the Laboratory of Oncomorphology and Molecular Genetics, designed by the author team headed by Ilya Mashkov (Mezonproject) uses the benefits of the natural context and offers space for cutting-edge research, both doctor- and patient-friendly.
The Logic of Life
The light installation, designed by Andrey Perlach in the atrium of Moscow's Federation Tower, balances on the edge between a mathematical order of construction and the diversity of perception when viewed from different angles.
An Architect in a Metaverse
In this interview, we talked to the participants of the festival of creative industries G8 about why metaverses are our tomorrow’s everyday routine, and how architects can already influence it today.