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Man and the City

Designing this large-scale housing complex, GAFA architects accentuated two types of public spaces: bustling streets with shops and cafes – and a totally natural yard, visually separated as much as possible from the city. Making the most out of the contrast, both work together to make the life of the residents of EVER housing complex eventful and diverse.

08 April 2021
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The large-scale housing complex EVER, designed by GAFA Architects, is built by TEKTA Group not far away from the crossing of Profsoyuznaya and Obrucheva streets, on the territory of an industrial estate that is being actively renovated. So far, it still includes garages of commercial fleets, surrounded by Soviet research institute buildings, but the place has huge potential: in addition to the fact that we are speaking about Moscow’s southeast, the most attractive area of the nation’s capital by default, the nearby projects include School 1514, one of the nation’s best, two parks – Vorontsovsky and the Southeast, and the Kaluzhskaya metro station, situated a 5-7 minutes’ walk away from here. Thus, it comes as no surprise that several residential complexes have appeared around here, with several more being built right now, EVER being one of them.

The complex, stretching from southwest to southeast along the Vlasova Street, consists of six “tower” buildings of an elongated configuration, each 120m high. Four houses stand on the border of the street, with two others standing perpendicular to them in the depth of the site – the composition turns out to be quite regular, based on two T-shaped groups, yet with some adjustments to the curve of the street and narrowing of the contours of the site towards the north. On the whole, according to the architects, it was defined by the insolation factor, the optimal configuration of the 3-level underground parking garage, and views from the windows.

EVER residential complex
Copyright: © GAFA


The construction process was divided into two phases, and the stylobates were divided accordingly: each carries three buildings, the gap between them becoming a “gorge” of sorts – an inner street, which, when the housing complex is complete, must become a full-fledged city space with cafes and shops. There are plans for throwing a pedestrian bridge over this street, which will connect the yards on top of the stylobates of the first and second phases. This way, the city space is also T-shaped, with an elongated link along the Vlasova street and a “leg” between the two groups of the houses.

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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    The master plan. EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA


Currently, the first phase has been fully designed and is being built: the three houses on a stylobate in the south part of the grounds; the design of the second phase has already begun.

Due to the fact that the complex is a high-density one – 34 floors on a 2.7-hectare land site – the architects, as they share, paid maximum attention to creating a comfortable living environment: visual, tactile, and functional diversity at the pedestrian level. Some of this diversity is ensured by the front of cafes/shops and a new street running between the two podiums.

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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA


Another important part is the yard on top of the stylobate. By contrast, it is designed as a natural one, even sporting some “naturally non-man-made” elements.

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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    The master plan of Phase 1. EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project.
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project.
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project.
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project.
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project.
    Copyright: © GAFA


The two-story “lintels” of the city front of the stores between the residential buildings surround the stylobate almost from three sides, their height in the facade part being 6 meters from the pavement level. Meanwhile, the middle part of the yard is situated lower, and it looks like a “saucer” with edges elevated 2-3 meters from the middle. This means that being inside, a person will be alternately surrounded by houses or slopes, which are interpreted by the authors of the project as park ones, combining greenery and other natural forms with amphitheaters, allowing you, on the one hand, to go up and down, and, on the other hand, just sit down on the stairs. The elevated outlines, like green bulwarks, will protect the yard partially from the street noise and partially from the visual one: they create a feeling of security, and channel one’s senses towards contemplating this, however small, but still a private park. This way, the city, which will be bustling all around and literally beneath the walls, will be separated from the inner “oasis” of the yard by volumetric and spatial means.

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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project. The natural amphitheater: the slate mountain and the pergola
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project. Pergola
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex The landscaping project. The natural amphitheater
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex The landscaping project. The natural amphitheater
    Copyright: © GAFA


Visually isolating the yard, the architects did everything possible to interpret this space as a park: they filled it with trees, for which tubs were provided, as well as other natural elements. The main pride of the architects is a slate hill in the eastern part of the grounds: a fragment of a “forest on a mountain” should appear here, a landscape not entirely Moscow, and perhaps – judging by the abundance of flowers among fragments of stone – even Alpine by character. Its ascent is decorated by curved lines; there is a playground lying next to it, from where the children will be able to climb this mountain. Still higher up, there is a streamlined pergola with a sightseeing platform on its roof – the yard’s biggest attraction, it also allowed the architects, like the slopes at the edges, to play with the levels of space perception. The pergola will be built by a detour around the trees, and a roller coaster will probably descend from the center: if all this is eventually implemented, it should become an attractor for both children and adults.

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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project.
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project.
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The landscaping project, the natural playground. A section view
    Copyright: © GAFA


A large part of the yard is stitched with a children’s game route.

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    EVER residential complex. The Zen garden
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. The Zen garden
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    EVER residential complex. The Zen garden
    Copyright: © GAFA


The yard is also zoned and divided into active and quieter parts. For example, above the Vlasova Street appeared a Zen garden with a pergola for meditation, and the roof of the parking garage ramp has a “secret garden” on it. Both of them are separated by “amphitheater” ascents, and, while the northwest slope is designed for children, this place could be equally used by adults. At the same time, everything – the pergolas, different paving patterns, lawns, knolls, and even the emergency vehicles lanes – is treated as a cohesive multifunctional space with an accent on natural forms and materials and a maximum of possible vegetation: “a person must have an opportunity to take a break from the urban rhythm, and this is why we invested so much effort into making this yard look like a fragment of true nature” – the architects emphasize.

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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA


The architecture of the residential buildings is also based on the principle of color and texture diversity. Their volumes are almost identical, but the solution of the facade in each of the buildings of both phases are ostentatiously different. Different are the colors: terra cotta brick, pale beige, white and black- everything within the framework of natural hues. The window patterns are also different: the windows are sometimes grouped in twos and fours vertically, and sometimes are drawn on their own. The facades of one of the three buildings of each of the construction stages are designed as “oscillating” volumetric mesh with protruding and sunken points – on the corners, they form a zigzag. In the first part, this house will be light, almost white, while in the second part it will be black. The facades of these two towers will be modular.

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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA


In addition, the facades are divided into a few parts based on the requirements of visual perception. When you look up from the ground up to the sixth floor inclusively, solid body brick is used with various types of masonry of different tones and textures. This falls in with the “rule of six floors” – the height, comfortable to perceive from the pedestrian level. Currently, the architects are selecting the right kind of brick, and are making mock-ups to find the exact material and pattern. Above the sixth floor, in addition to modular elements, painted panels and Klinker tiles a will be used. 

Still more attention is paid to the textures on the first floors, galleries, and entrance zones: here we can see special kinds of brick, for example, the plinth-shaped elongated kind, and glazed surfaces, each building being assigned a color of its own: blue-green, beige-gray, and red, all with majolica gradients and different brickwork patterns, vertical, horizontal, and “herringbone” respectively.

Furthermore, there are plans for decorating the ceilings of the outdoor galleries with porcelain stoneware with imitation of different minerals sawn-off – this way, the architects not just add gorgeous-looking decoration but also pay homage to geologist Vladimir Obruchev, in whose honor the street was named.

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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex
    Copyright: © GAFA


We worked a lot with the detailing of the lower area of the facades and now we continue to work with suppliers – all these solutions are very precious to us: options for brickwork, colors, and so on – we would very much like to preserve all this and bring it to fruition, creating a rich visual environment for people who will walk here. Wherever the eye falls, we should have something attractive, beautiful, and interesting. After all, people are not birds, they do not fly, they walk on foot, and in our opinion it is very important that what a person sees from the ground level is neatly drawn and thought out. Some of the brickwork offered by us will be created by the suppliers for the first time. I would very much like to see all this come true.

We are also very enthusiastic about the landscaping  project, a lot of work has also been done in that field, and we would like the proposed idea of a “virgin” environment to come true: it will allow a person who constantly lives in the context of a dense development of a big city to switch for a while and, relatively speaking, feel like a “savage on a rocky shore”.


The apartments are quite diverse: the towers have more than 30 types of layouts, “fine-tuning” which was quite a challenge. The windows the bottom floors, up to the sixth inclusively, are designed as French balconies; the height of glass here is 2.4 meters, two windowpanes opening like doors. Some of the apartments in the middle and upper tiers got open-air recessed balconies two meters deep, accessed through “window” doors reaching to the floor; sometimes the penthouses have two such doors, or – if the recessed balcony is on the corner- even three. Penthouses with raised floors occupy several floors, from 2 to 4, in the top part of each of the towers.

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    EVER residential complex. Plan of the 1st floor
    Copyright: © GAFA
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    EVER residential complex. A section view
    Copyright: © GAFA


The air conditioning units will be hidden in vertical recessions, dissecting the facades from top to bottom. In addition, some of the utility lines have been routed out of the apartments and grouped closer to the elevator chutes, which allowed the architects to save up a lot of floor space and give the future designers as much as possible freedom in handling the space.

This way, this large residential complex was thought out by the architects down to the last detail with a special emphasis on the scenarios of its life and the peculiarities of the perception of different parts: the upper floors received a relatively large drawing, the lower ones received detailed textured work, the streets, treated as urban, will feature shops and cafes, probably in the future with tables for outdoor terraces, and the courtyard will become a space fenced off from the city, the atmosphere of which is designed as being as natural as possible. We will note here that the stylobate yard stands little chance of becoming a “real wild jungle”: Moscow is not Singapore, and the land site is considerably small. Still, this place has a lot to offer for alternating and concentrating impressions, angles, and routes, meant to make up for the acutely urban environment.

08 April 2021

Headlines now
Terraced Design
The “River Park” residential complex has confidently and securely shaped the Nagatinsky Backwater shoreline. Featuring a public embankment, elevated courtyards connected by pedestrian bridges, and brick façades, the development invites exploration of its nuanced response to the surrounding context, as well as hints of the architects’ megalithic design thinking.
A Kremlin’s Core and Meteorite Fragments
We continue our coverage of the competition projects for the residential district that the development company GloraX plans to build along the embankment of the Rowing Channel in Nizhny Novgorod. ASADOV Architects approached the concept through a deep dive into local identity, using storytelling to pinpoint a central idea for the design: the master plan and composition are imagined as if a meteorite had struck a “proto-Kremlin”. Sounds weird? Find more details below!
The Volga Regatta
GloraX plans to develop a residential complex spanning 14 hectares along the Volga River in Nizhny Novgorod. The winning design in a closed-door competition, created by GORA Architects, features housing typologies ranging from townhouses to terraced high-rise slabs, a balance of functions, diverse ways of engaging with the water, and even a dedicated island (no less!) for the city residents.
A New Track
We took a thorough look at D_Station, a railcar repair depot dating back to 1906, recently reconstructed while preserving its century-old industrial structure, upon the project by Sergey Trukhanov and T+T Architects. Though work on the interiors – set to house restaurants and public spaces – is still underway, the building’s exterior already offers plenty to see. Visitors can explore the blend of old and new brickwork, appreciate the architect’s unique interpretation of ruin aesthetics, and enjoy the newly built pedestrian route that connects the Citydel Business Center’s arches to Kazakova Street.
Four Different Surveys
The “Explore the City” competition, organized this year by the Genplan Institute of Moscow, stands out as a pretty unconventional one for the architectural field but aligns perfectly well with the character of urban planning work. The winning project analyzed contemporary residential complexes, combining urban planning insights with a realtor’s perspective to propose a hybrid approach. Other entries explored public centers, motivations for car ownership, and housing vacancy rates. A fifth participant withdrew. Here’s a closer look at the four completed works.
Scheduled Evolution
ASADOV Architects unveiled the EvyCenter pavilion, a microcultural hub for fostering personal growth, organizing workshops, and doing gymnastics. Additionally, this pavilion serves as a prototype for a scalable country house, drawing inspiration from the “Loskutok” project, and constructed from CLT panels in a factory. This marks the beginning of a developer project initiated by the architectural firm (sic!), which is seeking partners to expand both small Evy settlements and even larger Evy cities, which are, according to Andrey Asadov, aimed at fostering the “evolutionary” development of the people who will inhabit them.
The Golden Crown
The concept for a dental clinic in Yekaterinburg, developed by CNTR Studio, revolves around the idea of a “mouth full of gold”: pristine white porcelain stoneware walls are complemented by matte brass details. To avoid an overly literal interpretation, the architects focused on the building’s proportions, skillfully navigating between sunlight requirements and fire safety regulations.
Flexibility and Integration
Not long ago, we covered the project for the fourth phase of the ÁLIA residential complex, designed by APEX. Now, we’ve been shown different fence concepts they developed to enclose the complex’s private courtyards, incorporating a variety of public functions. We believe that the sheer fact that the complex’s architects were involved in such a detail as fencing speaks volumes.
A Step Forward
The HIDE residential complex represents a major milestone for ADM architects and their leaders Andrey Romanov and Ekaterina Kuznetsova in their quest for a fresh high-rise aesthetic – one that is flexible and layered, capable of bringing vibrancy to mass and silhouette while shaping form. Over recent years, this approach has become ADM’s “signature style”, with the golden HIDE tower playing a pivotal role in its evolution. Here, we delve into the project’s story, explore the details of the complex’s design, and uncover its core essence.
Gold in the Sands
A new office for a transcontinental company specializing in resource extraction and processing has opened in Dubai. Designed by T+T Architects, masters of creating spaces that are contemporary, diverse, flexible, and original, this project exemplifies their expertise. On the executive floor, a massive brass-clad partition dominates, while layered textures of compressed earth create a contextually resonant backdrop.
Layers and Levels of Flight
This project goes way back – Reserve Union won this architectural competition at the end of 2011, and the building was completed in 2018, so it’s practically “archival”. However, despite being relatively unknown, the building can hardly be considered “dated” and remains a prime example of architectural expression, particularly in the headquarters genre. And it’s especially fitting for an aviation company office. In some ways, it resembles the Aeroflot headquarters at Sheremetyevo but with its own unique identity, following the signature style of Vladimir Plotkin. In this article, we take an in-depth look at the United Aircraft Corporation (UAC) headquarters in the Moscow agglomeration town of Zhukovsky, supplemented by recent photographs from Alexey Naroditsky – a shoot that became only recently possible due to the fact that improvements were finally made in the surrounding area.
Light and Shadow
In this article, we delve into the architectural design of the “Chaika” house by DNK ag architects, which was recently completed in 2023 as part of the collection of signature designs at ZILArt. As is well-known, all the buildings in this complex follow a design code, yet each one is distinct. This particular building stands out not only for its whiteness and minimalism but also for the refined use of a limited number of techniques that, together, create what can confidently be called synergy.
Casus Novae
A master plan was developed for a large residential area with a name of “DNS City”, but now that its implementation began, the plan has been arbitrarily reformatted and replaced with something that, while similar on the surface, is actually quite different. This is not the first time such a thing happens, but it’s always frustrating. With permission from the author, we are sharing Maria Elkina’s post.
Treasure Hunting
The GAFA bureau, in collaboration with Tegola and Arkhitail, organized an expedition to the island of Kilpola in Karelia as part of Moskomarkhitektura’s “Open City” festival. There, amidst moss and rocks, the students sought answers to questions like: what is the sacred, where does it dwell, and what sustains it? Assisting the participants in this quest were landscape engineer Evgeny Levin, artist Nicholas Roerich, a moose, and the lack of cellular connection. Here’s how the story unfolded.
Depths of the Earth, Streams of Water
In the Malaya Okhta district, the Akzent building, designed by Stepan Liphart, was constructed. It follows a classic tripartite structure, yet it’s what you might call “hand-drawn”: each façade is unique in its form and details, some of which aren’t immediately noticeable. In this article, we explore the context and, together with the architect, delve into how the form was developed.
Fir Tree Dynamics
The “Airports of Region” holding is planning to build an airport in Karachay-Cherkessia, aiming to make the Arkhyz and Dombay resorts more accessible to travelers. The project that won in an invitation-only competition, submitted by Sergey Nikeshkin’s KPLN, blends natural imagery inspired by the shape of a conifer seed, open-air waiting spaces, majestic large trees, and a green roof elevated on needle-like columns. The result is both nature-inspired and WOW.
​A Brick Shell
In the process of designing a clubhouse situated among pine trees in a prestigious suburban area near Moscow, the architectural firm “A.Len” did the façade design part. The combination of different types of brick and masonry correlates with the volumetric and plastique solutions, further enhanced by the inclusion of wood-painted fragments and metal “glazing”.
Word Forms
ATRIUM architects love ambitious challenges, and for the firm’s thirtieth anniversary, they boldly play a game of words with an exhibition that dives deep into a self-created vocabulary. They immerse their projects – especially art installations – into this glossary, as if plunging into a current of their own. You feel as if you’re flowing through the veins of pure art, immersed in a universe of vertical cities, educational spaces – of which the architects are true masters – and the cultural codes of various locations. But what truly captivates is the bold statement that Vera Butko and Anton Nadtochy make, both through their work and this exhibition: architecture, above all, is art – the art of working with form and space.
Flexibility and Acuteness of Modernity
Luxurious, fluid, large “kokoshniks” and spiral barrel columns, as if made from colorful chewing gum: there seem to be no other mansion like this in Moscow, designed in the “Neo-Russian-Modern” style. And the “Teremok” on Malaya Kaluzhskaya, previously somewhat obscure, has “come alive with new colors” and gained visibility after its restoration for the office of the “architectural ecosystem” as the architects love to call themselves. It’s evident that Julius Borisov and the architects at UNK put their hearts into finding this new office and bringing it up to date. Let’s delve into the paradoxes of this mansion’s history and its plasticity. Spoiler: two versions of modernity meet here, both balancing on the razor’s edge of “what’s current”.
Yuri Vissarionov: “A modular house does not belong to the land”
It belongs to space, or to the air... It turns out that 3D printing is more effective when combined with a modular approach: the house is built in a workshop and then adapted to the site, including on uneven terrain. Yuri Vissarionov shares his latest experience in designing tourist complexes, both in central Russia and in the south. These include houseboats, homes printed from lightweight concrete using a 3D printer, and, of course, frame houses.
​Moscow’s First
“The quality of education largely depends on the quality of the educational environment”. This principle of the last decade has been realized by Sergey Skuratov in the project for the First Moscow Gymnasium on Rostovskaya Embankment in the Khamovniki district. The building seamlessly integrates into the complex urban landscape, responding both to the pedestrian flow of the city and the quiet alleyways. It skillfully takes advantage of the height differences and aligns with modern trends in educational space design. Let’s take a closer look.
Looking at the Water
The site of Villa Sonata stretches from the road to the water’s edge, offering its own shoreline, pier, and a picturesque river panorama. To reveal these sweeping views, Roman Leonidov “cut” the façade diagonally parallel to the river, thus getting two main axes for the house and, consequently, “two heads”. The internal core – two double-height spaces, a living room and a conservatory, with a “bridge” above them – makes the house both “transparent” and filled with light.
The White Wing
Well, it’s not exactly white. It’s more of a beige, white-stone structure that plays with the color of limestone – smoother surfaces are lighter, while rougher ones are darker. This wing unites various elements: it absorbs and interprets the surrounding themes. It responds to everything, yet maintains a cohesive expression – a challenging task! – while also incorporating recognizable features of its own, such as the dynamic cuts at the bottom, top, and middle.
Urban Dunes
The XSA Ramps team designed and built a three-part sports hub for a park in Rostov-on-Don, welcoming people of all ages and fitness levels. The skate plaza, pump track, and playground are all meticulously crafted with details that attract a diverse range of visitors. The technical execution of the shapes and slopes transforms this space into a kind of sculptural composition.
Proportional Growth
The project for the fourth phase of the ÁLIA residential area has been announced. The buildings are situated on an elongated plot – almost a “ray” that shoots out from the center of the area towards the river. Their layout reflects both a response to Moscow’s architectural preferences over the past 15 years, shifting “from blocks to towers”, and an interpretation of the neighboring business park designed by SOM. Additionally, the best apartments here are not located at the very top but closer to the middle, forming a glowing “waistline”.
The “Staircase” Building
In designing the “Details” residential complex in New Moscow, Rais Baishev spiced up the now-popular Moscow theme of a “courtyard” building with an idea drawn from the surrealist drawings by Maurits Escher. He envisioned the stepped silhouettes and descending slopes as a metaphysical mega-staircase, creating a key void within the courtyard that gave the project an internal “spine”. This concept is felt both in the building’s silhouette and on its façades.
Projection of the Quarter
No one doubted that the building that Vladimir Plotkin designed as part of the “Garden Quarters” would be the most modernist of all. And it turned out just that way: while adhering to the common design code, the building successfully combines brick and white stone, rhythmically responding to the neighboring building designed by Ostozhenka, yet tactfully and persistently making a few statements of its own. This includes the projection of the ideal urban development composition “14–9–6”, which can be found right next door, mathematical calculations, including those for various types of terraces (and perhaps the only reminder of the Soviet past of the Kauchuk rubber factory!), and the white “cross-stitch” pattern of the façade grid.
Domus Aurea
In this issue, we examine the “Tessinsky-1” house, designed by Sergey Skuratov and completed in 2023. Located in the middle of the Serebryanicheskaya Embankment district, at the intersection of its main streets, this house assumes a sort of “nodal” role: it not only responds to everything around it and preserves many memories of the former EMA factory within itself, but it weaves all this into a newly directed pattern, reconciling bright “gold” and dark-colored brick, largely with the help of the new, modern-yet-archaic Columba brick, which, come to think about it, is the most precious element here.
The Chimney of Nikola-Lenivets
In this issue, we are examining the “Obelisk House” designed by KATARSIS and built for the Arkhstoyanie 2023 festival. However, it was only finished later on, and this is why we are examining it now. It seems to us that after the “Obelisk House” appeared in Nikola-Lenivets, a dialogue and a few inner connections appeared between the temporary structures built here. These houses no longer look like “accidental neighbors”, more of which below.
​Periscope by the Bay
The jury awarded the second place in the competition for a public and cultural center in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky to the companies GORA (“Mountain”) and M4. In the consortium’s proposal, the building resembles a sperm whale with a calf swimming next to it or a periscope, whose lenses capture the most spectacular views from the surrounding landscape.