Wandering Camera - Notes about St.Petersburg and it's suburbs

Wandering Camera

Album 274
(Translated by Ekaterina Ivanova)

In this and the next few albums, we will continue our tour along the Stachek avenue, which we didn't get a chance to finish last time, at the Park January 9th.
This time we will walk all the way to Avtovo metro station, and even a little bit farther, so we can take a look at the newly built viaduct.

The majority of the buildings in this area are residential; roughly, they were built between 1930 and 1950. Speaking in politically correct terms - this is the period of Neoclassicism, it is also known as "Stalin's empire"

The general scheme of the Stachek avenue was designed by an architect L.Ilyinm, who at the time was the chief architect of Leningrad. N. Trotsky offered an alternate plan for the development of the avenue, but it was rejected because it suggested a complete overturn of the existing district.

These two houses on the left (26 and 28) were designed by V.A.Kamenskii. In particular, the one with a tower was designed together with A.V. Mondzalevkii and was built in 1950's.

Here we can see three same-style houses 32, 34, 36.

They were designed by three female architects: G.L. Ashrapyan, O.S. Yakovleva and V.A. Kardakova. Before these houses were established, there was a side-walk of the Stachek avenue on that same place, i.e. the street was wider before, than it is now.

School #30, some other building that was built at about the same time, and some houses from earlier in the century look as if they are hidden behind, because of the three houses.

Building #32 up-close.

Since back then, designers and architects aimed to widen the streets, rather then narrow them down, one can conclude that in this way they consciously tried to break down "the display of foreign constructivism".

Building #34 - on the right.

The arches that are attached on the sides of the buildings are images of the tendency of that time's architecture, which can be outlined this way: "the buildings are ought to be spatially connected with each other". There were opponents to this point of view, who said that there's no need to build the arches and to waist scarce materials.

On the other side of the street there's a building #33.

This is an earlier construction, it was built in 1920's and the style is constructivism. The architects are A.S. Nikolski, A.I.Gheghello, D.L.krichevski, G.A.Simonov.

The corner of Stachek avenue and Ogorodni cross street. There's a house #42 on the right. It was designed by the same architects and was built at the same time.

Historically speaking, this place is called "Seraphimovski site".

House #40.

As I was suggested, this is a building of 1950's, because only at this time we are starting to have ceramic slabs on the fronts of the buildings and only at this time the sizes of the windows are beginning to standardize. (here we can see the typical window size, that was used for building later, at Stalin's time, and had a serial number of 1-405).

House #46. The architect is V.A.Kamenski, whom I had mentioned above already.

Same house, but from a different perspective.

This building is much older than we've seen before, #45.

It is known as a country-estate "Kir'yanovo" (before it was called "Kir i
Ioannovo")

Apparently, it was a built according to the scheme by D.Kvarenghi in 1783-1784.

The owner of the estate was princess E.R.Dashkova. She was the president of both Russian Academy of Sciences and The Academy of Sciences of St.-Petersburg.

There's an unauthorized version, that the estate was built according to her own scheme.

Since 1975 this estate functions as a Palace for Nuptials.

There used to be a park behind the estate, but it did not live long enough for us to see (it was destroyed in the early 19th century).

On the left you can see the a few buildings of Kirovski factory.

In front of the factory there are "new" buildings of the factory, the construction of which was aborted during perestroika.

In 1870's there was a Putilovskaya railway which was connecting Kirovski factory with other factories of the city and with the primary thoroughfares.

This is the beginning of the Kirovski factory, which occupies a vast territory - as far as the Ekateringhovka River.

The fence, presumably, was built in 1950's.

This is the emblem of this factory - letter "K" in the center of a gear-wheel.

A little deviation from the factory theme - right across the street there is an old building #48, the building of Mr.Boghomolov, 1872)

Coming back to the factory...

Since 1801, cast iron industry was using the territory (it was moved from Kronshtadt). Starting in 1868, it was renamed as "Putilovski", since the owner was N.I.Putilov. By the end of the 19th century this factory was the biggest metallurgical factory in Russia.

Therefore, the number of workers employed was big.
During the revolutions of 1905-1917, they played an important role in the revolutionary movement. Starting in October 1917, they were assembling armoured trains to protect Petrograd (St.-Petersburg) from "White Guards".

Skipping a little bit further into the century (next album) - the commissar of that armoured train, which was assembled in October was I.I.Ghaza - one of the workers of Putilovski factory).

On December 27, 1917 the factory was nationalized and starting in 1922 it was renamed "Krasni Putilovets" ("Red Putilovets"). From this time on they produced metal ware for Volhovskaya hydroelectric power station. In 1923-1924 they started to produce tractors "Fordzone-putilovets" for the first time in USSR.
In 1930's - hoisting cranes, train cars, train bays.

In 1934 the factory was renamed Kirovski again, in the memory of S.M.Kirov.

During the war the factory was partially moved to Ural.
After the war they started to produce turbines for atomic-powered vessels, landrovers, tractors "Kirovets", and of course, tanks.

If we take into consideration what we hear from people in publics vehicles, and what we hear from friends, we can conclude that prsently the factory almost doesn't function.

Of course, no one is planning to close the factory down, considering the number of workers employed by the factory. Nominally, the factory is now open joint-stock company.

Show-room of the Kirovski factory.

It was constructed in front of the entrace check-point in 1999-2000.

I should take a note, that it inscribed rather well into the scheme of the area... Even though, other opinions exist :)

"There was no time in the history of revolutionry movement in Russia, when the name of the mighty putilovski worker was not heard". S.M.Kirov

The Stachek avenue is now a very busy street. In addition, in some places it is clearly felt that there are some ecological problems, because of the exhaust gases of the cars.

Metro station "Kirovski Zavod" ("Kirovski Factory").

This building somewhat reminds one of the most popular buildings in USA - memorial of Lincoln in Washington (it is pictured on a five-dollar bill). It is being known, that originally in the space between the entrance and the exit, there was supposed to be statue (talhough, not in sitting position, like Linclon's).

If anyone at the time would pay attention to this building and draw parallels to the memorial in USA, then the life of the architect could have mysteriously been ended :)

The station was opened for public use in 1955, it was built according to the plan by A.K.Andreev.

If we pay attention to the doors and windows, we can see some similarities in decoration with metro station "Narvskaya", although the two buildings are entirely different.

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