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Concept
Narkomfin building
Summary
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. A reconstruction, which lasted more than three years, was completed in the summer of 2020, with the official opening of the renovated apartment building took place on 9 July.
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.
Official source
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