Tuesday, 31 January 2012

Devichye Pole Park



Kauchuk Factory Club




Kauchuk Factory Club constructed in 1927 - 1929 is a public building designed by Konstantin Melnikov.  Kauchuk rubber factory, originally based in Riga, relocated to Khamovniki District in Moscow in 1915, threatened by German offensive, and was considerably expanded afterwards.  Kauchuk Club is shaped as simple quarter of cylinder, housing a 800 seat theatre hall with two balcony levels.  Melnikov's trademark exterior  stairs (now under restoration ) were never intended for regular use, they are actually fire escapes connected to the second floor lobby.

Friday, 27 January 2012

Rusakov Workers' Club







The Rusakov Workers' Club is a great example of Constructivist architecture.  Designed by Konstantin Melnikov, it was constructed in 1927 / 1928.  The club is built on a fan-shaped plan, with three cantilevered concrete seating areas rising above the base.  Each of these volumes can be used as separate auditorium, and combined they result in a capacity of over 1,000 people.  At the rear of the building are more conventional offices.  The function of the building is to some extent expressed in the exterior, which Melnikov described as a  "tensed muscle".  I love this building very much.

Friday, 9 December 2011

The worker


The worker bas relief at Petrovsky Passazh.
By Matvei Manizer  1921

Thursday, 8 December 2011

Red Telephone Box


Looks familiar.....
BTW no telephone in it

Moscow Zoo


Moscow Planetarium


The Moscow Planetarium designed by architects Mikhail Barshch and Mikhail Sinyavsky was opened on November 5, 1929.  In the 1960s was used an educational centre for the first Russian cosmonauts.  The building was abandoned for 17 years and then reopened on June 12, 2011 

Sunday, 27 November 2011

Novodevichy Convent







This UNESCO listed Convent was founded in 1525 to celebrate Grand Prince Vasily III's recapture of Smolensk in1514. Many aristocrats took their vows here and it became known as a nunnery of the nobility.
Most of the buildings in the Moscow Baroque style were added in 1680 by Regent Sophia, Peter the Great's half sister, ironically later imprisoned by him here in 1689. The Convent was occupied in 1812 by Napoleon's troops, and later used as a female prison before becoming a Museum of Women's Emancipation during Communism.  It has been a working Convent since 1994.

Thursday, 20 October 2011

Tuesday, 18 October 2011

Bulat Okudzhava




Poet, Singer-Songwriter  1924 / 1997

Narkomfin Building





The Narkomfin Building, one of the best pieces of Russian Constructivist  architecture still surviving, was designed by Moisei Ginzburg with Ignaty Milinis in 1928 and finished in 1932.  Its novel architectural ideas had a wider influence, including on Le Corbusier, whose Unité d'Habitation adopted its duplex living units accessed at their midpoints by glazed corridors.  The  building is in a very bad state of repair: hopefully conservation will save it for posterity and for future students of original architecture

Street Art in Arbat


In memory of  Viktor Tsoy

Friday, 7 October 2011

Faberge Egg House


SPAT / Sergey Tkachenko
2002

Narkomzem



Narkomzem  (the People's Commissariat of Agriculture )
by Aleksei Shchusev  (best known for his design of the Lenin Mausoleum)

1933

Centrosoyuz Building



Centrosoyuz,  the Central Union of the Soviet Union, is the only building by Le Corbusier in Russia.
Goskomstat, the State Statistic Committee, currently occupies the building

Le Corbusier,  Pierre Jeanneret and Nikolai Kolli
1929 - 36

NKPS Building


NKPS (People's Commissariat of Transport and Communications)
Ivan Fomin
1928-31

Krasnye Vorota Metro Station


Designed by architects Ivan Fomin and  N. Andrikanis
1935