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Narkomfin building
The Narkomfin Building is a block of flats at 25, Novinsky Boulevard, in the Central district of Moscow, Russia. Conceived as a "transitional type of experimental house", it is a renowned example of Constructivist architecture and avant-garde housing design.
Though a listed "Cultural Heritage Monument" on the Russian cultural heritage register, it was in a deteriorating state for many years. Many units were vacated by residents. Reconstruction lasted three years, with the official opening of the renovated apartment building taking place on 9 July 2020.
The project for four planned buildings was designed by Moisei Ginzburg with Ignaty Milinis in 1928. Only two were built, completed in 1932. The color design for the buildings was created by Bauhaus student Hinnerk Scheper.
This apartment block, designed for high rank employees at the Commissariat of Finance (shortened to Narkomfin) was an opportunity for Ginzburg to try out many of the theories advanced by the Constructivist OSA group between 1926 and 1930 on architectural form and collective living. The building is made from reinforced concrete and is set in a park. It originally consisted of a long block of apartments raised on pilotis (with a penthouse and roof garden), connected by an enclosed bridge to a smaller, glazed block of collective facilities.
As advertised by the architects, the apartments were to form an intervention into the everyday life (or byt) of the inhabitants. By offering Communal facilities such as kitchens, creches and laundry as part of the block, the tenants were encouraged into a more socialist and, by taking women out of their traditional roles, feminist way of life. The structure was thus to act as a 'social condenser' by including within it a library and gymnasium.
On the other hand, architects of the 1920s had to face the social reality of an overcrowded socialist city: any single-family apartment unit with more than one room would eventually be converted to a multi-family kommunalka. Apartments could retain the single-family status if, and only if, they were physically small and could not be partitioned to accommodate more than one family. Any single-level apartment could be partitioned; thus, the avant-garde community (notably, Ginzburg and Konstantin Melnikov) designed such model units, relying on vertical separation of bedroom (top level) and combined kitchen and living room (lower level). Ilya Golosov implemented these cells for his Collective House in Ivanovo, and Pavel Gofman for communal housing in Saratov. Ginzburg refined their cell design based on real-life experience.
Narkomfin has 54 units, none of them has a dedicated kitchen - at least, legally. Many residents partitioned their apartments to set aside a tiny kitchen. There are five inhabited floors, but only two corridors on second and Fifth level (an apartment split between third and second level connects to the second floor corridor, etc.).
Apartments were graded by how far along they were to being 'fully collectivised', ranging from rooms with their own kitchens to apartments purely for sleep and study. Most of the units belong to "Cell K" type (with double-height living room) and "Cell F" connecting to an outdoor gallery. The sponsor of the building, Commissar of Finance Nikolay Alexandrovich Milyutin, enjoyed a penthouse (originally planned as a communal recreation area). Milyutin is also known as an experimental city planner who had developed plans for a linear city.
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Narkomfin building
The Narkomfin Building is a block of flats at 25, Novinsky Boulevard, in the Central district of Moscow, Russia. Conceived as a "transitional type of experimental house", it is a renowned example of Constructivist architecture and avant-garde housing design.
Though a listed "Cultural Heritage Monument" on the Russian cultural heritage register, it was in a deteriorating state for many years. Many units were vacated by residents. Reconstruction lasted three years, with the official opening of the renovated apartment building taking place on 9 July 2020.
The project for four planned buildings was designed by Moisei Ginzburg with Ignaty Milinis in 1928. Only two were built, completed in 1932. The color design for the buildings was created by Bauhaus student Hinnerk Scheper.
This apartment block, designed for high rank employees at the Commissariat of Finance (shortened to Narkomfin) was an opportunity for Ginzburg to try out many of the theories advanced by the Constructivist OSA group between 1926 and 1930 on architectural form and collective living. The building is made from reinforced concrete and is set in a park. It originally consisted of a long block of apartments raised on pilotis (with a penthouse and roof garden), connected by an enclosed bridge to a smaller, glazed block of collective facilities.
As advertised by the architects, the apartments were to form an intervention into the everyday life (or byt) of the inhabitants. By offering Communal facilities such as kitchens, creches and laundry as part of the block, the tenants were encouraged into a more socialist and, by taking women out of their traditional roles, feminist way of life. The structure was thus to act as a 'social condenser' by including within it a library and gymnasium.
On the other hand, architects of the 1920s had to face the social reality of an overcrowded socialist city: any single-family apartment unit with more than one room would eventually be converted to a multi-family kommunalka. Apartments could retain the single-family status if, and only if, they were physically small and could not be partitioned to accommodate more than one family. Any single-level apartment could be partitioned; thus, the avant-garde community (notably, Ginzburg and Konstantin Melnikov) designed such model units, relying on vertical separation of bedroom (top level) and combined kitchen and living room (lower level). Ilya Golosov implemented these cells for his Collective House in Ivanovo, and Pavel Gofman for communal housing in Saratov. Ginzburg refined their cell design based on real-life experience.
Narkomfin has 54 units, none of them has a dedicated kitchen - at least, legally. Many residents partitioned their apartments to set aside a tiny kitchen. There are five inhabited floors, but only two corridors on second and Fifth level (an apartment split between third and second level connects to the second floor corridor, etc.).
Apartments were graded by how far along they were to being 'fully collectivised', ranging from rooms with their own kitchens to apartments purely for sleep and study. Most of the units belong to "Cell K" type (with double-height living room) and "Cell F" connecting to an outdoor gallery. The sponsor of the building, Commissar of Finance Nikolay Alexandrovich Milyutin, enjoyed a penthouse (originally planned as a communal recreation area). Milyutin is also known as an experimental city planner who had developed plans for a linear city.