Yards and Towers: the Samara Experiment

The project of “Samara Arena Park”, proposed by Sergey Skuratov, scored second place in the competition. The project is essentially based on experimenting with typology of residential buildings and gallery/corridor-type city blocks combined with towers – as well as on sensitive response to the context and the urge to turn the complex into a full-fledged urban space providing a wide range of functions and experiences.

Written by:
Julia Tarabarina
Translated by:
Anton Mizonov

11 March 2021

Object

The competition for “Samara Arena Park”, conducted by MAAM in the past 2020, was devoted to the concept of developing the land site not far away from the new arena, built in Samara for the World Soccer Championship 2018, at the northern outskirt of the city, on the way to the Kurumoch Airport. Almost simultaneously with it, another competition was conducted, for landscaping the land around the Arena – it was clear that Samara decided to give a serious thought to actualizing the territories lying along the Moscow Highway. The Arena Park is located south of the stadium, and, if we are to drive from the city center to the airport, it will be lying right of the highway. The site is essentially greenfield – a vacant lot for construction with rather pleasant surroundings: it is flanked by woodland on either side, with dacha estates lying south of it.

First place in the “Arena Park competition was scored by the project submitted by the Danish company Juul | Frost Arkitekter, about which we already shared: it looks like a cross between a picturesque asymmetric medieval town and a “garden” city with liberal greenery, with grass growing even on the rooftops.

The project by Sergey Skuratov, which came second, is also characterized by keen attention to detail in terms of landscaping of public territories, but it is more focused on other tasks. The architects approached working with the concept as an opportunity to experiment with the typology of residential buildings: they abandoned the predominance of a sectional building, generally accepted in Russian construction design over the past 20 years, in favor of a mix of gallery and corridor houses with towers as part of city-block development.

zooming — The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020

The project ended up consisting largely of city blocks, where in the northern part, closer to the roads, as well as sports fields and playgrounds, galleries are mainly located – spaces for movement, not life, for which noise and poor insolation are not as critical as for bedrooms or living rooms.

As a result, we are seeing a very unconventional planning approach: the thickness of the buildings that frame a city block varies from place to place because it is sometimes of the gallery type (consisting of one row of apartments), and sometimes of the corridor type (the apartments being grouped along the corridor, and the volume becoming thicker). Interestingly, the inner passage itself remains unbroken: the gallery bleeds into a corridor and vice versa, it meets the elevator halls, goes in loops, provides access to the neighboring block, and sometimes makes a zigzag, receding and making room for corner apartments. Furthermore, these corner apartments, mostly of a larger size than average, sometimes even stand out on their corners, not even trying to keep the contour intact, but, conversely, catching light and panoramas.

Above the “thick” corridor volumes in the spots of the staircase-and-elevator cores, grow five landmark towers 22 stories high, which comprise 25% of the housing stock. The other 75% fall on the low-rise houses from five to seven stories high.

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020

The proposed layouts, flexible and coherent, allowed the architects to save up on the staircase-and-elevator units: they are fewer than they would have been in a regular house, divided into narrow isolated sections.

The adaptive character of the solution is highlighted by asymmetry: eleven blocks of different sizes are joined, like atoms, into molecules of two or three volumes, connected on the inside by galleries and corridors. The resulting composition has something of Brownian motion about it – one can see that it parametrically reacts to internal requirements and external conditions.

The apartment design is focused on the dominance of small flats, dictated by the market: studios and one-room apartments totally account for more than a half of the complex (these layouts are particularly numerous in the corridor planning). However, the offered line includes the entire range up to 4-room abodes – in the towers. The set includes both traditional and “European” layouts with kitchens functioning as living rooms. But then again, according to the architects, the apartments are designed flexibly and can be fine-tuned – what the complex offers is the approach, and not a solution carved in stone, which is what makes it even more interesting.

The low height of the blocks – we will note here that it decreases in the southern part, and increases to the north and towards the highway – made it possible to provide enough natural light to the courtyards. Interestingly, in order to make the yards as green as possible, the architects proposed to vacate their central parts from the underground car park: the single level of the car park gravitates towards the contours of the houses, and thus it will be possible to plant trees with a good root system in the center of each yard. We will also note that the degree of openness and closeness of the facades in the courtyard depends in a very noticeable way on the level of illumination: where the sun is, there is glass, where the shadow is, the walls prevail.

1 / 3

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
2 / 3

The simplified plan of the private yards. The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
3 / 3

Plan of the -1st floor: car parks, public functions, and maintenance. The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020

It is here on the first floors that apartments with private little gardens appear. According to the concept, the yards are only accessible to the residents.

The plan for combining retail on the outer contour with little gardens in the yard. In the section view we can see the underground car park with “breaks” in the central parts of the yards. The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / c
The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020

However, it does not just come down to the composition of the houses with their experimental layouts and “garden” yards. Sergey Skuratov interprets his housing project as a mini-city, paying a lot of attention to public spaces inside. Between the blocks, city squares form, the territory of each of which is comparable in size to the in-block courtyard. This way, the spatial unit becomes common for the yard and the plaza, while their functions and accessibility are different – the architects interpret the inner squares as the “city yards” and include them into the overall count – thus, together with the public spaces, there are 16 yards, 11 private (residents-only), and 5 accessible to the city people.

The entrances to the territory of the complex are located on each of the four sides, practically in the cardinal points, between the blocks, open to the surroundings, but not exactly “wide-open”. Interestingly, the passage from the side of the noisy highway is relatively narrow – it also provides protection from the noise. The squares are grouped closer to the center, three of them are strung on the meridian axis: the main, “noisy” square intended for gatherings and events, paved almost entirely, is located closest to the highway; to the south, a pond area adjoins it, with an amphitheater by the water, further, closer to the dachas, a square – the activity seems to “dissolve in nature” from the highway to the quiet village.

In the eastern part of the complex, between the blocks, there is a school; next to it, on the first floors of the residential buildings, there are two built-in kindergartens. Between the central square and the school there is a playground or a “children’s square” open to everyone, also with an amphitheater (note that both amphitheaters are built into the terrain, which rises here, in total, by 5 meters towards the highway, and in the center it has a drop of about 2 meters). South of the school, there is a “sports square”, fifth by count. The so-called commercial, a.k.a rentable, bottom floors with shops and cafes are grouped both on the outer contour of the complex and on the side of the inner plazas.

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020

The entire volumetric and functional layout is interpreted as a mix of well-known morph types of urban construction: a square, a yard, and a tower – to which Sergey Skuratov makes a direct reference, presenting his project as a variant of a city tested by centuries. In other words, according to this experimental competition project at the edge of Samara, behind the belt of micro-district development, among forests, fields, dachas, and industrial parks, could arise a “small town” with quite diverse morphology and hierarchy of spaces, compact, structurally diverse, and well thought out.

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020

Outwardly, it does not imitate the forest environment at all, and does not try to present itself as a part of the natural relief – on the contrary, all lines and volumes are straight, rigid, very man-made and even somewhat brutal, even with a slight flavor of industrial architecture. To some extent, the town appears as a “fort” – mainly due to the straight contours and the closeness of the outer walls. Which, I will remind you here, provides protection from the outside noise, and is characterized by a much greater amount of glazing, and a greater number of courtyards. Tower houses also create the image of a solid and reliable town, which does not spread over the field, but is quite capable of “standing up for itself.”

When viewed from a distance, the Sergey Skuratov complex looks like a countryside Renaissance estate somewhere in the fields of Lombardy: the collected and regular volumes present a striking contrast to the pastoral surroundings. The yards and the towers make one recall the Castello Sforzesco – we will note here, and this is important, that the analogies that appear here are based not on the “natural” medieval but on the renaissance city – the latter is more governed by the rational component and larger forms. And, besides, it is only the renaissance palazzo that can be characterized by a combination of a large green yard and an imposing tower; this is what makes it different from the cramped middle-age construction, where such yards could only be seen in the monasteries, and from the tenements of the XIX century, where both yards and towers were “squeezed” to yield more useful floor space. Basically, the experiment, carried out in this project, goes far beyond the confines of a purely planning task, and proposes some kind of a detailed, if not groundbreaking, version of block housing construction, not alien to, let’s say, traces of semblance with a number of historical prototypes.

The façade color – Sergey Skuratov’s favorite combination of brick-red and white – also supports themes of both renaissance fort and industrial architecture. The two corner towers are fully red, the central one is white, and another two – again, the architect’s favorite technique – combine both colors, which ensures the diversity of beautiful views of the complex. The same thing with the city blocks: red prevail over white, yet in the yards the facades are light-colored. The school building is white.

A beautiful view is presented by the portals of the south blocks from the side of the dacha settlement: the white rounded “legs” in the first floors and the hilly terrain below them make up an overpass, designed by the principle of the Narkomfin Building, designed by Moisei Ginzburg, just like the “green leg” underneath the houses, leading from the yard to the surroundings.

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020

So, let us note that in addition to the planning and typological experiment in the project there is a significant proportion of responding to specific circumstances, and even of contextual “molding” of the complex that responds to the specifics of the environment: the difference in elevation and the contrast between the rigidity and activity of the environment near the highway, and natural relaxation on the border with the gardeners’ non-commercial partnership.

Inside the complex, also appears an image teetering on the verge of old industrial architecture and a renaissance city, or maybe even post-renaissance, which emotion-wise can be likened to the postwar Milan: the towers, and the facades, reasonably straight, yet diverse in their texture. On the city squares, just like on the outside, there are quite a lot of walls, the glass does not prevail at all, and the space itself makes a smooth transition from the “city” square, regular and fully paved, to the more “lively” pond and little park. This vicinity, just as the diversity of the facades, ensures some kind of “gradient of impressions” built on the same leitmotif of going from city bustle to natural relaxation, which generated the yards open southward.

At first glance, much in this project is quite familiar, since it corresponds to modern trends: from the combination of blocks with the “correct” height of 5-7 floors with dominant towers, looking as if they were taken from a textbook on modern urbanism, and ending with the predominance of small apartments with a general variety of layouts, courtyards without cars, front gardens, public spaces, and a balance of natural and urban environment.

Yet, on the other hand, everything is very unusual. First of all, this is the asymmetry and the ostentatiously varied character of the city block “molecules” that look even more like cells viewed under a microscope: they stick to each other, split apart, their membranes sometimes thicker and sometimes thinner, and they respond both to inner logic and outside irritators. Another unusual thing is the set of layout options – it is common knowledge that gallery and corridor houses are not exactly popular nowadays. And why not? Provided the galleries prevail over corridors and are well lit (well, still worse than in the case of a “living room” layout, but still), this option could be in some respects quite attractive. Of course, I am not sure how many chances it stands to shake the already formed market trends: the market is a pretty inertial thing, and, unless forcefully taken out of its comfort zone, it will stick to time-tested solutions. Still, though, let’s not forget that this is an experimental project, even though it would be really interesting to implement it – it is highly unlikely that this will ever take place in Moscow with its trend to build complexes consisting of three towers each 200m high, but in Samara something like this is worth a shot.

1 / 4

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
2 / 4

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
3 / 4

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020
4 / 4

The concept of the housing project near Samara Arena / competition project 2020

11 March 2021

Headlines now

The Mirror of Your Soul

We continue to publish projects from the competition for the design of the Russian Pavilion at EXPO in Osaka 2025. We are reminding you that the results of the competition have not been announced, and hardly will ever be. The pavilion designed by ASADOV Architects combines a forest log cabin, the image of a hyper transition, and sculptures made of glowing threads – it focuses primarily on the scenography of the exhibition, which the pavilion builds sequentially like a string of impressions, dedicating it to the paradoxes of the Russian soul.

Part of the Ideal

In 2025, another World Expo will take place in Osaka, Japan, in which Russia will not participate. However, a competition for the Russian pavilion was indeed held, with six projects participating. The results were never announced as Russia’s participation was canceled; the competition has no winners. Nevertheless, Expo pavilion projects are typically designed for a bold and interesting architectural statement, so we’ve gathered all the six projects and will be publishing articles about them in random order. The first one is the project by Vladimir Plotkin and Reserve Union, which is distinguished by the clarity of its stereometric shape, the boldness of its structure, and the multiplicity of possible interpretations.

Object

The Fortress by the River

ASADOV Architects have developed a concept for a new residential district in the center of Kemerovo. To combat the harsh climate and monotonous everyday life, the architects proposed a block type of development with dominant towers, good insolation, facades detailed at eye level, and event programming.

Object

In the Rhombus Grid

Construction has begun on the building of the OMK (United Metallurgical Company) Corporate University in Nizhny Novgorod’s town of Vyksa, designed by Ostozhenka Architects. The most interesting aspect of the project is how the architects immersed it in the context: “extracting” a diagonal motif from the planning grid of Vyksa, they aligned the building, the square, and the park to match it. A truly masterful work with urban planning context on several different levels of perception has long since become the signature technique of Ostozhenka.

Object

Generational Connection

Another modern estate, designed by Roman Leonidov, is located in the Moscow region and brings together three generations of one family under one roof. To fit on a narrow plot without depriving anyone of personal space, the architects opted for a zigzag plan. The main volume in the house structure is accentuated by mezzanines with a reverse-sloped roof and ceilings featuring exposed beams.

Object

Three Dimensions of the City

We began to delve into the project by Sergey Skuratov, the residential complex “Depo” in Minsk, located at Victory Square, and it fascinated us completely. The project has at least several dimensions to it: historical – at some point, the developer decided to discontinue further collaboration with Sergey Skuratov Architects, but the concept was approved, and its implementation continues, mostly in accordance with the proposed ideas. The spatial and urban planning dimension – the architects both argue with the city and play along with it, deciphering nuances, and finding axes. And, finally, the tactile dimension – the constructed buildings also have their own intriguing features. Thus, this article also has two parts: it dwells on what has been built and what was conceived

Object

New “Flight”

Architects from “Mezonproject” have developed a project for the reconstruction of the regional youth center “Polyot”(“Flight”) in the city of Oryol. The summer youth center, built back in the late 1970s, will now become year-round and acquire many additional functions.

Object

The Yauza Towers

In Moscow, there aren’t that many buildings or projects designed by Nikita Yavein and Studio 44. In this article, we present to you the concept of a large multifunctional complex on the Yauza River, located between two parks, featuring a promenade, a crossroads of two pedestrian streets, a highly developed public space, and an original architectural solution. This solution combines a sophisticated, asymmetric façade grid, reminiscent of a game of fifteen puzzle, and bold protrusions of the upper parts of the buildings, completely masking the technical floors and sculpting the complex’s silhouette.

Object

Architecture and Leisure Park

For the suburban hotel complex, which envisages various formats of leisure, the architectural company T+T Architects proposed several types of accommodation, ranging from the classic “standard” in a common building to a “cave in the hill” and a “house in a tree”. An additional challenge consisted in integrating a few classic-style residences already existing on this territory into the “architectural forest park”.

Overview

The U-House

The Jois complex combines height with terraces, bringing the most expensive apartments from penthouses down to the bottom floors. The powerful iconic image of the U-shaped building is the result of the creative search for a new standard of living in high-rise buildings by the architects of “Genpro”.

Object

Black and White

In this article, we specifically discuss the interiors of the ATOM Pavilion at VDNKh. Interior design is a crucial component of the overall concept in this case, and precision and meticulous execution were highly important for the architects. Julia Tryaskina, head of UNK interiors, shares some of the developments.

send.project

The “Snake” Mountain

The competition project for the seaside resort complex “Serpentine” combines several typologies: apartments of different classes, villas, and hotel rooms. For each of these typologies, the KPLN architects employ one of the images that are drawn from the natural environment – a serpentine road, a mountain stream, and rolling waves.

send.project

Opal from Anna Mons’ Ring

The project of a small business center located near Tupolev Plaza and Radio Street proclaims the necessity of modern architecture in a specific area of Moscow commonly known as “Nemetskaya Sloboda” or “German settlement”. It substantiates its thesis with the thoroughness of details, a multitude of proposed and rejected form variants, and even a detailed description of the surrounding area. The project is interesting indeed, and it is even more interesting to see what will come of it.

Object

Feed ’Em All

A “House of Russian Cuisine” was designed and built by KROST Group at VDNKh for the “Rossiya” exhibition in record-breaking time. The pavilion is masterfully constructed in terms of the standards of modern public catering industry multiplied by the bustling cultural program of the exhibition, and it interprets the stylistically diverse character of VDNKh just as successfully. At the same time, much of its interior design can be traced back to the prototypes of the 1960s – so much so that even scenes from iconic Soviet movies of those years persistently come to mind.

Object

The Ensemble at the Mosque

OSA prepared a master plan for a district in the southern part of Derbent. The main task of the master plan is to initiate the formation of a modern comfortable environment in this city. The organization of residential areas is subordinated to the city’s spiritual center: depending on the location relative to the cathedral mosque, the houses are distinguished by façade and plastique solutions. The program also includes a “hospitality center”, administrative buildings, an educational cluster, and even an air bridge.

send.project

Pargolovo Protestantism

A Protestant church is being built in St. Petersburg by the project of SLOI architects. One of the main features of the building is a wooden roof with 25-meter spans, which, among other things, forms the interior of the prayer hall. Also, there are other interesting details – we are telling you more about them.

Object

The Shape of the Inconceivable

The ATOM Pavilion at VDNKh brings to mind a famous maxim of all architects and critics: “You’ve come up with it? Now build it!” You rarely see such a selfless immersion in implementation of the project, and the formidable structural and engineering tasks set by UNK architects to themselves are presented here as an integral and important part of the architectural idea. The challenge matches the obliging status of the place – after all, it is an “exhibition of achievements”, and the pavilion is dedicated to the nuclear energy industry. Let’s take a closer look: from the outside, from the inside, and from the underside too.

send.project

Rays of the Desert

A school for 1750 students is going to be built in Dubai, designed by IND Architects. The architects took into account the local specifics, and proposed a radial layout and spaces, in which the children will be comfortable throughout the day.

Object

The Dairy Theme

The concept of an office of a cheese-making company, designed for the enclosed area of a dairy factory, at least partially refers to industrial architecture. Perhaps that is why this concept is very simple, which seems the appropriate thing to do here. The building is enlivened by literally a couple of “master strokes”: the turning of the corner accentuates the entrance, and the shade of glass responds to the theme of “milk rivers” from Russian fairy tales.

send.project

The Road to the Temple

Under a grant from the Small Towns Competition, the main street and temple area of the village of Nikolo-Berezovka near Neftekamsk has been improved. A consortium of APRELarchitects and Novaya Zemlya is turning the village into an open-air museum and integrating ruined buildings into public life.

Object

Towers Leaning Towards the Sun

The three towers of the residential complex “Novodanilovskaya 8” are new and the tallest neighbors of the Danilovsky Manufactory, “Fort”, and “Plaza”, complementing a whole cluster of modern buildings designed by renowned masters. At the same time, the towers are unique for this setting – they are residential, they are the tallest ones here, and they are located on a challenging site. In this article, we explore how architects Andrey Romanov and Ekaterina Kuznetsova tackled this far-from-trivial task.

Object

In the spirit of ROSTA posters

The new Rostselmash tractor factory, conceptualized by ASADOV Architects, is currently being completed in Rostov-on-Don. References to the Soviet architecture of the 1920’s and 1960’s resonate with the mission and strategic importance of the enterprise, and are also in line with the client’s wish: to pay homage to Rostov’s constructivism.

send.project

The Northern Thebaid

The central part of Ferapontovo village, adjacent to the famous monastery with frescoes by Dionisy, has been improved according to the project by APRELarchitects. Now the place offers basic services for tourists, as well as a place for the villagers’ leisure.

send.project

Brilliant Production

The architects from London-based MOST Architecture have designed the space for the high-tech production of Charge Cars, a high-performance production facility for high-speed electric cars that are assembled in the shell of legendary Ford Mustangs. The founders of both the company and the car assembly startup are Russians who were educated in their home country.

Object

Three-Part Task: St. Petersburg’s Mytny Dvor

The so-called “Mytny Dvor” area lying just behind Moscow Railway Station – the market rows with a complex history – will be transformed into a premium residential complex by Studio 44. The project consists of three parts: the restoration of historical buildings, the reconstruction of the lost part of the historical contour, and new houses. All of them are harmonized with each other and with the city; axes and “beams of light” were found, cozy corners and scenic viewpoints were carefully thought out. We had a chat with the authors of the historical buildings’ restoration project, and we are telling you about all the different tasks that have been solved here.

Object

The Color of the City, or Reflections on the Slope of an Urban Settlement

In 2022, Ostozhenka Architects won a competition, and in 2023, they developed and received all the necessary approvals for a master plan for the development of Chernigovskaya Street for the developer GloraX. The project takes into account a 10-year history of previous developments; it was done in collaboration with architects from Nizhny Novgorod, and it continues to evolve now. We carefully examined it, talked to everyone, and learned a lot of interesting things.

Object

A Single-Industry Town

Kola MMC and Nornickel are building a residential neighborhood in Monchegorsk for their future employees. It is based on a project by an international team that won the 2021 competition. The project offers a number of solutions meant to combat the main “demons” of any northern city: wind, grayness and boredom.

Object

A New Age Portico

At the beginning of the year, Novosibirsk Tolmachevo Airport opened Terminal C. The large-scale and transparent entrance hall with luminous columns inside successfully combines laconism with a bright and photogenic WOW-effect. The terminal is both the new façade of the whole complex and the starting point of the planned reconstruction, upon completion of which Tolmachevo will become the largest regional airport in Russia. In this article, we are examining the building in the context of modernist prototypes of both Novosibirsk and Leningrad: like puzzle pieces, they come together to form their individual history, not devoid of curious nuances and details.

Object

A New Starting Point

We’ve been wanting to examine the RuArts Foundation space, designed by ATRIUM for quite a long time, and we finally got round to it. This building looks appropriate and impressive; it amazingly combines tradition – represented in our case by galleries – and innovation. In this article, we delve into details and study the building’s historical background as well.

Object

Molding Perspectives

Stepan Liphart introduces “schematic Art Deco” on the outskirts of Kazan – his houses are executed in green color, with a glassy “iced” finish on the facades. The main merits of the project lie in his meticulous arrangement of viewing angles – the architect is striving to create in a challenging environment the embryo of a city not only in terms of pedestrian accessibility but also in a sculptural sense. He works with silhouettes, proposing intriguing triangular terraces. The entire project is structured like a crystal, following two grids, orthogonal and diagonal. In this article, we are examining what worked, and what eventually didn’t.

​Yards and Towers: the Samara Experiment

Yards and Towers: the Samara Experiment