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Architecture tours

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Our architecture tours are signiture tours, offered by our guide Alexis Chernorechensky. Please confirm his availability before booking.
 

 

Afternoon of a Faun // art-nouveau in Moscow



Fyodor Shekhtel: Yaroslavsky train station
Fyodor Shekhtel: Yaroslavsky train station
Recognized as a shared architectural style throughout the whole of Europe, be it Barcelona, Paris, Vienna or Saint-Petersburg, art-nouveau infected the Old World with an unprecedented virus. Europe got filled with sophisticatedly ornamented constructions, becoming home to myriads of mythological characters.
 
Impressive and sometimes strikingly extravagant from the outside, most of these houses possess none the less fantastic interiors. Often defined by the taste of the owner, these buildings eloquently represent the ambiance and mood of the epoque.

Art-nouveau in Moscow is represented by dozens of famous architects, who contributed to forming the new image of then-provincial city. Although deeply rooted in Russian tradition, folk-tales and realities, art-nouveau metaphors and principles will clearly be understood to anyone, as this truly international style put a solid bridge between Moscow and the rest of the world.

 

Little Boxes On the Hillside // constructivism in Moscow



Melnikov house
Melnikov house
Hi-tech constructions, now shaping the planet's contemporary look, are competing in lightness of structure, wise space organization, minimalism combined with somewhat gigantomaniac scales. It would only suffice to evoke Sydney Opera House, Centre Beaubourg, Empire State Building for clearer understanding.

Formation and triumph of constructivism were not, nevertheless, a sudden blast of a bomb. A huge laboratory of preliminary experiment was needed, but sometimes such experiments are unduly underestimated or even forgotten nowadays.

Moscow constructivism is not the lesser interesting and deserving of attention than, say, the White Town in Tel-Aviv, amazing Bauhaus enclave in the Middle East. Additional flavour to many of these objects scattered around Moscow is their location off the beaten paths.

This tour will draw attention to how and on what philosophical, technical and even romatic and revolutionary principles the whole of the constructivism was based. There will be a possibility to see both impressive and seemingly modest constructions, which gave birth to most findings in the functionalism of the late 20th century.

 

Stars Go Squawking // Stalin Neorenaissance



Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Building
Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Building
Some tend to demonize Stalin and his epoque, while others try to justify his historical role despite diabolic purges. The truth is as usual somewhere inbetween. Many of those who had a chance to work with the dictator, still recollect that he was first of all a talented man with a deep insight into many matters.

Architecture was one of his favourite topics, and dozens of historical anecdotes about his talks with architects are still circulating. The period known as 'Stalin Neorenaissance' (or 'Empire' at times) was not just a historic coincidence. This was a deeply rooted and thoroughly planned process, reflecting the system's desire to build strongholds 'for ever and ever'.

This tour will give a chance to get acquaited with many blood-freezing and astounding detective stories, which accompanied architectural discussions of the thirties, as well as introduce to the symbolic Universe of the new-born Soviet mythology.

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