Soviet architecture is characterized by the constant search for forms: characteristics of rationalism and constructivism attracted architects striving to give houses maximum functionality.
Forget CGI, the post–Soviet Union may be the best landscape for Star Wars.
Image 1 of 17 from gallery of A Rare View of Siberia's Soviet Architecture. Photograph by Zupagrafika
Soviet architecture is characterized by the constant search for forms: characteristics of rationalism and constructivism attracted architects striving to give houses maximum functionality.
Nutsubidze Plato 1 (Saburtalo District) in Tbilisi, Georgia. Constructed 1974-1976. Modernist, Soviet architecture in the former USSR.
We had a day to see the Soviet Architecture on offer in Tbilisi, Georgia. We arranged a tour with Brutal Tours and took off on an architecture safari!
Brutalism – an architectural style of the XX century that separated from modernism. Architects who work in this style are soft on brutal forms and getting much
Image 11 of 18 from gallery of How Slovakia's Soviet Ties Led to a Unique Form of Sci-Fi Architecture. Memorial and Museum of the Slovak National Uprising, by architect Dušan Kuzma, 1963-1970. Banská Bystrica, Slovakia. Image © Stefano Perego
Cybernetics Intitute, Saint-Petersbourg – 1987. When one thinks of something fascinating, Soviet brutalist architecture does not come to mind. However, Frédéric Chaubin’s remarkable photographs, pu…
Wedding Palace (Palace of Rituals) in Tbilisi, Georgia. Completed in 1984. Modernist, Soviet-era architecture in the former USSR.
Soviet architecture is characterized by the constant search for forms: characteristics of rationalism and constructivism attracted architects striving to give houses maximum functionality.
Image 2 of 17 from gallery of A Rare View of Siberia's Soviet Architecture. Photograph by Zupagrafika
Each tower feels like it has something to prove.
Frédéric Chaubin documents 90 buildings in 14 former-USSR republics belonging to what he calls the 'fourth age' of Soviet architecture.
Romanita Collective Housing Tower in Chisinau, Moldova. Completed in 1986 - an example of Brutalist, Soviet architecture in the former USSR.
BBC’s Jonathan Glancey chooses his favourites. Georgia’s Ministry of Highway Construction is among the top ten. Ministry of Highway Construction, Tbilisi, Georgia, 1975More Constructivist than Brutalist, this tour-de-force is by George Chakhava who, as deputy minister of the Georgia Ministry of Road Construction, was both client and architect. Although influenced by Russian Revolutionary architects of the 1920s, Chakhava says that the building’s monumental interlocking structural grid is rooted in nature. His aim was to occupy as little ground space as possible with the various floors of the building opening out like branches from the central root of a tree. Whatever his reasoning, this is a truly spectacular design. Restored, from 2007 it has been the headquarters of The Bank of Georgia. (Credit: Courtesy Phaidon Press)FOLLOW THE GALLERY:{{ArticleSplitCont}}Basel College of Art and Design Basel, Switzerland, 1961 by Baur, Baur, Bräuning, DürigBrutalism has become something of a catch-all term for highly expressive concrete architecture dating from the mid-1950s. Quite how brutal this Swiss art and design college is, is open to question. Its architect, Hermann Baur [1894-1980], called it “poetically utilitarian”. Comprising a cluster of four buildings around a courtyard centred on a Hans Arp sculpture, the highlight is undoubtedly the college gym. Its folded roof and walls - concrete origami - form an elegant hall, used today as a lecture room and art students’ studio. One wall is a floor-to-ceiling window: the play of light on concrete is quite beautiful. (Credit: Roberto Conte){{ArticleSplitCont}}Orange County Offices and Court House, Goshen, New York, US, 1967In 2015, this critically acclaimed complex was demolished in an act of civic vandalism. Comprising three concrete pavilions, with projecting bays, around a courtyard, it offered a rich variety of imaginatively lit and free-flowing spaces. Designed by Paul Rudolph, former chair of Yale University’s Department of Architecture, whose alumni included Norman Foster and Richard Rogers, it needed remedial work even before, in 2011, it was damaged by Hurricane Irene. Despite an offer by the New York architect Gene Kaufman to buy and restore it as an art space, Orange County had more brutal designs on this memorable public building. (Credit: Photo Nicolás Saieh){{ArticleSplitCont}}Centro de Exposições, Salvador, Bahía, Brazil, 1974This astonishing exhibition hall is suspended five metres above ground, its rough surfaced concrete body supported by steel struts held in tension by a pair of slim masts housing a lift and stairs. An amphitheatre in the guise of an inverted pyramid below one end of the suspended hall is balanced ̵ visually and physically ˗̵̵ by a sky-lit, pyramid gallery above the opposite end. While it seems odd to find such a Brutal design in a tropical climate, its concrete shell protects exhibits and visitors from heat and glare. It was designed by the inventive Brazilian architect João Filgueiras Lima. (Credit: Courtesy Fran Parente){{ArticleSplitCont}}Jenaro Valverde Marín Building, CCSS, San José, Costa Rica, 1976 by Alberto Linner DíazSet between the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean, Costa Rica might seem like the last country anyone would expect to find Brutalist architecture. Pre-fabricated concrete construction, however, allowed Central and South American architects to launch into the Modern world at low cost and on a grand scale. From the 1940s, Oscar Niemeyer, had paved the way in Brazil. Although simple in plan and section, this social security administration building by the Nicaraguan born architect Alberto Linner Díaz has the look of a bold and complex concrete sculpture, its powerful character offset by colourful plants and swaying palms. (Credit: Magda Biernat/OT TO){{ArticleSplitCont}}Hemeroscopium House, Madrid, Spain, 2008 by Ensamble StudioThis bravura house gives the illusion of a huge weight of concrete supported by nothing more than a sheer glass wall. It is the home of Antón García-Abril and Débora Mesa, principals of the architecture practice Ensamble Studio, who say that engineering took a year, while the pre-fabricated structure was erected in just seven days. One of the projecting beams is a swimming pool: quite clearly it has taken considerable reinforcing to make the concrete elements of the house do the architects’ bidding. But, as Mesa says, as if she was talking about Brutalism itself, this is “Architecture out of the comfort zone.” (Credit: Roland Halbe){{ArticleSplitCont}}Boston City Hall, Boston, Massachusetts, USA, 1968Almost 50 years old, this daunting civic building is as controversial as ever. In 2013, The Boston Globe said, “City Hall is so ugly that its insane upside-down wedding-cake columns and windswept plaza distract from the building’s true offense. Its great crime isn’t being ugly; it’s being anti-urban.” According to Gerhard Kallmann, the City Hall’s co-designer, “It had to be awesome, not just pleasant and slick”, reminding “you of ancient memories, history”. Kallmann and his partner Michael McKinnell were thinking of an updated ancient classical monument seen through the lens of Le Corbusier and tens of thousands of concrete slabs. (Credit: Ezra Stoller / Esto)For full gallery follow the linkRelated Stories: Most progressive and modernist – Georgia’s 20th century building regarded as world masterpiece Georgia's CCCP: Cosmic Communist Constructions Photographed
Arseniy Kotov finds inspiration in urban exploration and concrete cityscapes.
Cybernetics Intitute, Saint-Petersbourg – 1987. When one thinks of something fascinating, Soviet brutalist architecture does not come to mind. However, Frédéric Chaubin’s remarkable photographs, pu…
Angular, geometric shapes, hard edges, and monolithic constructions. You are either in a Lego set or looking at an example of brutalist architecture. It’s a devise style, with some seeing it as the pinnacle of function over form, while others just think of endless, soulless commie blocks, with rotting, exposed concrete.
Discover how the brutal designs of Soviet architecture were reimagined in the USSR’s eastern periphery
Soviet architecture is characterized by the constant search for forms: characteristics of rationalism and constructivism attracted architects striving to give houses maximum functionality.
"Soviet Brutalist architecture is beautiful and strange, much of it like some odd abandoned spaceship, long-forgotten Hollywood Sci-Fi set ...
An exhibition of Soviet Modernist architecture from across the former USSR
Soviet Cities: Labour, Life & Leisure was created by Russian photographer Arseniy Kotov after a tour of post-Soviet republics between 2016 and 2020 during which he stayed in over 200 cities.
Image 11 of 11 from gallery of The Brutalist Architecture that Shaped Poland's Urban Landscapes. Photograph by Zupagrafika
Guide to Yerevan Soviet architecture: where to find it, how to get there, map with the locations. All you need to know about Yerevan architecture.
10 of the best examples of Soviet architecture in Tbilisi and how to visit them. Includes Tbilisi Brutalism, mosaics in Tbilisi and much more.
Image 2 of 11 from gallery of Why Soviet Architecture Isn’t Russia's Answer. © Arseniy Kotov / Shutterstock
Brutalism – an architectural style of the XX century that separated from modernism. Architects who work in this style are soft on brutal forms and getting much
For all the Soviet Union’s faults, by traversing its vast architectural landscape, we can get a glimpse of what a built environment for the many, not the few, could look like.
Image 16 of 17 from gallery of A Rare View of Siberia's Soviet Architecture. Photograph by Zupagrafika
Forget CGI, the post–Soviet Union may be the best landscape for Star Wars.
