CITY FAMILY
The mood of this small apartment (52 sq. M) is set by the history of the building in which it is located. The city estate in the center of Kiev, on Pushkinskaya Street, was built in 1898 according to the design of Andrei-Ferdinand Krauss, the beloved architect of the capital's nobility of the late XIX - early XX centuries. Among his other works are the neo-Gothic "Richard the Lionheart's Castle" on St. Andrew's Descent, the Bessarabian quarter, houses on Reitarskaya, Bolshaya Vasilkovskaya and other streets.
The owner of the apartment publishes books on architecture and urbanism, is interested in design. Looking for housing, she first of all paid attention to the houses, which became an important part of the architectural history of Kiev. At the entrance of the building on Pushkinskaya there is a wide front staircase with elegant railings, and the facade serves as a vivid example of Krauss's style. Among the main wishes of the owner of the apartment to designer Yuriy Zimenko - the interior should be in tune with the style of the building, at the same time remain modern, lightweight functional. It was important to consider the layout in such a way as to preserve and emphasize the main advantages of the apartment, including four-meter ceilings. This was taken into account in engineering solutions and reflected in the decor: heavy sheets of velvet curtains from floor to ceiling and a round mirror in the center of the wall in the living room accentuate the vertical space.
Broad massive moldings, repeating the facade, and stucco molding on the ceiling in the living room, which were able to be preserved in their original form, also recall the history of the building. Among the retro elements tactfully installed in a modern interior are dark openwork mesh on the doors of kitchen cabinets, patterned floor tiles, aluminum sconces and a mirror in a carved frame in the bathroom. The central element of the living room was a rare lithograph of a limited edition of one of the most famous works of the French artist Georges Braque, “Tube, wineglass, playing brush and newspaper” of 1963.
In a calm neutral gamma of the interior, the mood is created by bright flashes of color - deep green, electric blue, cyan and coral. In the initial layout, one global change was made: the kitchen area with all communications was moved to the living room area. The result is a functional living space with a place to sleep and a living room with dining room.
But in the end, we managed to integrate all communications into the area above the bedroom doorway. ” - comments Yuri Zimenko.
In a calm neutral gamma of the interior, the mood is created by bright flashes of color - deep green, electric blue, cyan and coral. In the initial layout, one global change was made: the kitchen area with all communications was moved to the living room area. The result is a functional living space with a place to sleep and a living room with dining room.
But in the end, we managed to integrate all communications into the area above the bedroom doorway. ” - comments Yuri Zimenko.
