Alena Solntseva Twice on the problems of preserving memory in the urban environment of Old Bogorodsk 04/09/2023, 10:43

Last weekend, architects I know took me to Noginsk to see the buildings built by the great Russian architect Alexander Kuznetsov. To be honest, before that I did not know anything about Noginsk or Kuznetsov, but I trust my friends and, as it turned out, not in vain.

First, I will mention Kuznetsov, whose name is hardly known, although he is considered the founder of the Russian industrial architectural school and, together with Vesnin, formed an architectural training in Moscow and oversaw the construction of TsAGI. He created the first version of the future VDNKh. Petersburg and Berlin, taught at VKhUTEMAS and at the Moscow Architectural Institute. More than one generation of Soviet architects learned. But the construction of the Novotkatsky plant in the village of Glukhov near Bogorodsk, which is now Noginsk, brought it its first glory.

The building, built in 1907, still exists, though it’s hard to see it under the plethora of crooked outbuildings and the rubbish and building materials dumped in front of the already idle workshops. What made the building great was the abundance of daylight in the workshops, passing through special trihedral lanterns on the roof. Unlike traditional multi-storey factory buildings with side lighting, Kuznetsov designed a single-story building that occupies a large area, is lit from above and allows working in natural light for as long as possible. From the inside, the glass lanterns looked like crystals, the rhythmic structure of which helped navigate the factory space.

No less important were the air purification and filtration systems created by Kuznetsov, ingenious ways of protection from the direct rays of the sun. With such a technological innovation, it turned out that the factory also had an elegant beauty. Functionally it was already constructivist and visually modern. The gracefully curved concrete canopies above the ventilation pipes have been compared to Gaudí’s Barcelona fantasies.

At the same time, Kuznetsov found many amenities that were rare for that time – dressing rooms with separate lockers for personal belongings, spacious lobbies. In addition to the factory, Kuznetsov built the building of a women’s gym in Bogorodsk, and its main customer, Arseny Ivanovich Morozov, the owner of the Novotkatskaya factory, a house for a member of the huge Old Believer Morozov family known today. mainly from Serov’s portraits.

Arseniy Morozov constantly lived in the factory, went into all the details of his working life, was a strict but fair master father to his workers, so much so that one visiting American correspondent compared the factory to feudal ownership: “In such a factory, an industrial, mechanical revolution, with feudalism – or at least backwards. co-exists with some of its remaining features. And the country house of the owner of such a factory, although it was built only yesterday and certainly resembles the country house of an American millionaire, in relation to the servants to the owner, it looks more like a medieval baron’s castle.

Medieval or industry, but textile magnate Arseniy Ivanovich took care of the workers. Through their efforts, architecturally luxurious four-story dormitories were built, which the same American journalist described: “One to three bedroom apartments with iron stairs, stone floors and facing a corridor that runs through the entire building. Most of these apartments were occupied by families, each with a small cottage in the garden, as well as a large wooden chest in the room and a shelf for other things. Food and laundry were washed in common areas, with a dozen chimneys for coal stoves and samovars. Rooms are bright and clean for modest Russian taste. Most of the windows were covered with flower pots. That’s why they looked better than the flats of workers of the same income in the United States. These people had a huge advantage – they already lived outside the city. It only took a few minutes to walk from the residence to the edge of the pine forest.”

Now in these buildings there is a psychiatric hospital, a narcology dispensary and dormitories. Ruin and desolation reigns everywhere, the windows are plywooded, the walls are peeling, they smell of piss, but the elegance of the window frames, door sills and cast iron railings is still mesmerizing.

Morozov also built excellent buildings for a vocational school – to train qualified specialists, a maternity hospital – so they said about local women that they worked in a factory, but gave birth in a palace – a hospital and a pharmacy.

But the main passion of Arseny Morozov, an educated person (he studied in England, knew European languages, collected art), was the legalization of the Old Believer faith in Russia after the tsar’s 1906 decree. Therefore, Kuznetsov built in his new stylish house a large prayer room, where Old Believer clergy gathered and served, awaiting the opening of a real church built in Rogozhskaya Sloboda. In the prayer room, the famous Morozov choir sang together, singing znamenny (or hook). Morozov published religious journals and was active in social activities. Under his auspices, 15 rural churches were built in the county. He himself lived in austerity and demanded sobriety and docile behavior from the workers. The workers treated him kindly: after the revolution, of course, they kicked him out of the house, the factories were nationalized, but he was not shot, he was not exiled. Morozov died naturally in 1932, shortly after his son Sergei.

Sergei Arsenyevich, together with the revolutionary Nogin, who gave the old Bogorodsk its name, restored and improved weaving production in the new Soviet Russia. But in 1930 he was arrested for the Industrial Party case, spent ten years in the camps and died in Siblag.

Another son, Peter, went to the United States during the First World War, organizing the organization of the supply of American weapons for the Russian army on behalf of the Moscow Military Industrial Committee. He never returned to Russia.

The Leader Hotel has now been built on the foundation of the house built for the sons.

And in the house of Arseny Ivanovich they arranged a kindergarten, in which the building as a whole was preserved. In the 2010s, a State Duma deputy bought the place and started the restoration process – and a private museum was later opened on the property.

The house-museum of the Morozov family is open to the public, admission with a guided tour costs 1000 rubles per person, there is no benefit on weekends, you must register by phone in advance. Nothing authentic has been preserved inside the house, apart from the surprisingly durable German stove tiles. There were many stoves in the house, they were repaired, some of them are working.

Furniture and household items are either modern items that Morozov bought in France, or local items found in the factory or donated by the residents concerned. That is, he is a puppet of the everyday situation of that time. There is only one authentic item – a copper bath in a sewer-filled basement and therefore apparently not delivered to scrap.

Of course, today the museum exhibits are much more interesting, it is clear that in the house of Morozov there are no qualified specialists in exhibition work, but visitors, mostly families with children, like modern mannequins dressed in stylized shirts and trousers.

We still perceive history as a decoration, an attraction where ostentation is more valuable than originality. Therefore, Orthodox icons of the 19th century hang in the Old Believer masjid, and the Morozov family tree cannot be seen – the curtains on the windows are always closed, and the chandeliers are dim (and this is in the house of Kuznetsov, the architect obsessed with natural light).

But the museum still exists, the house has not been destroyed, people are walking around, and the memory of Arseniy Morozov lives on.

The author expresses his personal opinion, which may not coincide with the editors’ position.