Tag: art nouveau architecture

architecture · no recipe · on USSR / Russia · St Petersburg · travel

Duderhof and Taytsy Estate

georgiagilmourLeave a comment

Duderhof

On the last day of May we explored a bit more of the region around St Petersburg, covering two spots in one go – Duderhof (aka Mozhaysky) and Taytsy Estate. Duderhof is situated right at the edge of the city, bordering with the Leningrad region, while Taytsy is already inside the region, though these two are just a few kilometers away from each other.

Duderhof

Our first stop was the 1890 railway station still called Mozhayskaya (after a Russian aviation pioneer Mozhaysky) although the settlement itself has now officially regained (one of) its previous name(s), Duderhof. We have quite a few German or pseudo-German toponyms around here, like Peterhof, Shlisselburg and even St Petersburg itself. The station building is not Art Nouveau yet but definitely very close. And then we moved a little bit further up the road to find this…

Duderhof

As part of my quest to visit all those Art Nouveau mansions scattered all over St Petersburg and its region, I had plans to see this one in particular as it seemed to fulfill not only the architectural ‘rules’ of this movement but also their aspirations towards a perfect location that would serve the purpose.

Duderhof

This is a hospital for cancer patients, built on a hill overlooking the plains below it. There’s plenty of air, so the location is perfect for convalescence and walks in the surrounding area.

Duderhof

And it was built by the maitre of Art Nouveau, Lutsedarsky, right at the start of this architectural movement, yet in its ‘romantic’ stage, in 1900-1902, for the sisters of charity. It does look like a small castle particularly when seen from the road as it sits on the hill surrounded by small houses and fields. The Russian ‘Alps’ view:

Duderhof

Love this semi-circular wooden element:

Duderhof

…and the ‘window’ on the left – not mentioning the grate and the tower!

Duderhof

Not much is known about it, probably due to its extra-muros location. It is now occupied by a skiing school for children actually. Well, at least it’s somewhat looked after, maybe not in the perfect way but it’s not in the worst state for an Art Nouveau site outside St Petersburg either. Contrary to that, all that is left from one of the nearby wooden houses for the invalids (late 19th century) is this:

Duderhof

We climbed up the hill through a sort of a forest to this place – with a view too. This is Duderhof heights, reaching up to 176 meters which makes it the highest ‘peak’ of St Petersburg. A perfect skiing location with very specific snow conditions during the winter season – as well as nice place for walking with a curious mixture of trees and plants, plus a water source.

Duderhof

Unfortunately, the highest point of St Petersburg was not always all about skiing and just had to be very heavily involved during the war. The monument on one of the slopes of the hill represent the feat by the courageous crew of the famous Aurora cruiser who were deployed here with the guns taken from the ship. They got attacked by the enemy and very few of them survived the battle, after which the heights were captured in September 1941. The Nazis used this height to their full advantage of course – the city was there right below their feet… but never was it at their feet!

Duderhof

***

Our next stop was at Taytsy, a small settlement with a long history. As with many estates after the 1917 it got turned into a sanatorium (a sort of a health resort for working people), a collective farm (!) and later a rehab center. Now it serves film crews as a filming location, and inevitably falling into disrepair.

Taytsy Estate

When we were there they were shooting something there, the main building was occupied and we could get a peep inside through a slit in the ‘shutters’. They did not say anything to us wandering about but we didn’t wander off very far either. There are other dilapidated buildings around the main ‘palace’, bearing the signs of their Soviet past on them.

Taytsy Estate

But I wanted to go to Taytsy mostly for the sake of its park which promised to be just as decadent in late spring as it is in late autumn. The lilac was in full blossom and the other trees were preparing for the summer as well.

Taytsy Estate

You can study the way a park which was so carefully planned and then so much cared for for many years, got completely out of hand when left to its own that the nature has got it all back. Particularly obvious with this bridge which was made to look ‘natural’ and now has such a natural look that you can’t get any better than this! (my father’s picture of the same view is here)

Taytsy Estate

The trees looked happy with their now all-natural style.

Taytsy Estate

It reminded me of the abandoned Soviet sanatorium I saw a year ago in Alupka, Crimea.

Taytsy Estate

It was actually built in the late 18th century by a prolific classicist architect Ivan Starov to adorn the 110 ha park. The estate has changed many hands, from Pushkin’s relatives to one of the Demindov family, the noble and super rich family who made their fortune thanks to mining and metal.

Taytsy Estate

Now the estate is abandoned even by those tired workers who used to regain their health here. There were some weird sort of construction going on nearby but we couldn’t see as the territory was behind a fence. I just hope they won’t turn it into a dacha for the rich and powerful.

Adding this post to the collection about the Environs of St Petersburg.

G.

architecture · no recipe · on USSR / Russia · St Petersburg

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

georgiagilmourLeave a comment

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

This summer inspired by the excursion to the Vitebsky railway station where we learned quite a bit about the technologies of the early 20th century, I made a walk in the center of the city up to the Bolsheokhtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge. It belongs to the same period and uses the same construction method which at that time was considered quite revolutionary.

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

On my way to the Bridge there were a few unavoidable stops as you just can’t resist pulling your camera out and making some photos. Above – a neo-baroque late 19th century green eye-catcher that looks pretty well in a combination with a brightly painted red ex-gymnasium building just a few meters away from it. And here’s a late Art Nouveau building (or rather ‘Northern Modern’ as it is called in Russia) that I used to pass by every day heading towards one of my jobs. It is in a very poor state now but it was supposed to look like a fortress or a castle, with its impressive walls and stonework at the ground floor level.

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

Built in 1911-12 this residential house still preserves its original windows and judging from the photographs taken in its inner courtyard and inside it has not yet lost some of those details that would help create the Medieval atmosphere around it.

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

St Pete’s backstage:

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

And now on to the Bridge that connected a – then – suburb Okhta (hence the first name) with the center of the city. As with a couple of other bridges in St Petersburg (like Troitsky linking the center to the Petrogradskaya side) its construction was not at all desired by those who provided transport services from one side of Neva river to the other. Those who did want the bridge to be built were the people who had to embark on a boat in order to commute.

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

With its tons of metal all over the place Bolsheohtinsky Bridge does look pretty powerful and at the same time – so effortless in how it stretches from one side to the other in just three spans. The most often used adjective when describing this bridge in Russian is ‘azhurny‘, laced. The lighthouse-like towers hide the mechanisms that draws the central span inside them – and thanks to them this bridge resembles London’s Tower Bridge built in the late 19th century. Ironically Bolsheohtinsky Bridge did impersonate the famous bridge over Thames in the 1983 Sherlock Holmes series, the best by the way, – see how they turned Thames into Neva… or vice versa here :). This element here looks very Northern Modern, as if someone like Art Nouveau guru Robert Metlzer created this metal curve:

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

The project that won the competition was developed and then fine-tuned by engineers, including Vladimir Apyshkov who created one of the Art Nouveau jewels, Chagin’s mansion, now a dental clinic. The legend has it that one of the clenches was made of pure gold but since all of the clenches are of the same colour – and there are more than a million of them – nobody has found it yet. Another interesting fact is that the bridge was constructed so well that it required some renovation only as late as 1970s. And yes, the second name of the bridge, which was abolished during the Soviet era, comes from the fact that it was laid down in 1909, exactly 200 years after Peter the Great won the Poltava battle, one of the decisive moments in the war with Sweden. The bridge opened to traffic in 1911.

Bolsheohtinsky aka Peter the Great Bridge

This photo is taken from the Okhta side of the Neva river. It has been so heavily Soviet-style urbanized that for me – probably yet – it doesn’t really seem attractive. Okhta, a right-had tributary of Neva, gave its name to the settlement that used to be a carpenters’ village from the early 18th century. It later grew into one of those industrial suburbs surrounding the city, with many factories and a shipyard. But it also became the place where the rest of the city would get its milk and dairy from – the full-bodied Okhta women would come to various districts of St Petersburg selling their fresh produce and thus making their living.

Adding this post to the St Petersburg series.

G.

architecture · no recipe · on USSR / Russia · St Petersburg

Public Dental Clinic in Art Nouveau Mansion

georgiagilmour2 Comments

Chaev's Mansion

Imaging fixing your teeth in an Art-Nouveau mansion without paying a single kopeck / cent, etc? That’s what might happen to you if you live permanently in the Petrogradsky district of St Petersburg and need a dentist. Yes, some crucial things are still free of charge in Russia, we inherited it from the USSR.

Chaev's Mansion

The mansion that the public (and hence free) dental clinic occupies since 1935 was originally built by Vladimir Apyshkov (who would later create the impressive Bolsheokhtinsky Bridge over Neva) for a wealthy engineer in 1906-07.  It was consequently purchased by other people and enhanced with two wings, one of which was designed by Fedor Lidval. However, the mansion is still known as Chaev’s mansion, after its first owner.

Chaev's Mansion

This is a rather cold type of Art-Nouveau, that is sometimes referred to as ‘hygienic style’, meaning a polished appearance almost devoid of any decorations, with the buildings usually faced with smooth bricks and tiles. In this case the choice of the ‘hygienic’ moderne (Art-Nouveau in Russian) for Chaev’s mansion almost predicted its future use!

Chaev's Mansion

This mansion’s style is edging on the neoclassical one as well. Just look at these figures (above) or this railing on one of the mansion’s staircases:

Chaev's Mansion

And as usual – everything in Art Nouveau is in details:

Chaev's Mansion

The mansion reminds me of another – more well-known – mansion of the Petrogradsky Island which belonged to the famous Russian ballerina and emperor’s sweetheart (they say) Kschessinskaya (now occupied by the Museum of the Political History of Russia). It was built in 1906 and had definitely – and immediately – an influence on other mansions designed during that period.

Chaev's Mansion

Chaev’s mansion is planned in a curious way: you enter through a tower-like cylinder…

Chaev's Mansion

and proceed into a round hall with a mirror ceiling (which originally was a glass ceiling to allow for natural light to flow in):

Chaev's Mansion

And then there’s yet another circle waiting ahead – the winter garden, like in Kschessinskaya’s mansion:

Chaev's Mansion

Very generous windows!

Chaev's Mansion

These three elements are interspersed, creating not only quite unusual space but also a weird sensation (must be even more weird when your teeth are aching!). They say that the glass ceiling was actually the third floor’s, well, floor, where the servants would live. Their dining table used to run all around that glass ceiling / floor not to block the light. Also, the kitchen and the laundry were placed on the top floor to avoid the unwanted aromas in the master’s room below.

Chaev's Mansion

It’s not that easy to imagine how it used to be in this mansion 100 years ago. Some of the interiors have been reconstructed but it’s obvious that all the oak panels, paintings and Louis XVI furniture are long gone.

Chaev's Mansion

And when you hear those dentist’s sounds (brrr!) you are for sure reminded that all these people sitting around waiting (wearing the inevitable bakhily – plastic overshoes, see the women’s feet in the picture below) are not Chaev’s guests!

Chaev's Mansion

A long-living leftover from the original mansion?

Chaev's Mansion

They say that the pool room is now occupied by the ‘dental cabinet #3’ whereas the head doctor sits in the former boudoir. The orthopedists are in the bedroom and the dental laboratory is in… the bathroom 🙂 By the way, this dental clinic was one of the only that worked all through the Siege of Leningrad.

Chaev's Mansion

 An interpretation of Otto Wagner‘s omega?

Chaev's Mansion

By the way, Chaev mansion is on … Roentgen Street (used to be Litseyskaya Street), close to the First Medical University campus. Which needs to be investigated into as well sometime soon!

This post goes to my never-ending St Petersburg series.

G.