Ostozhenka – a Moscow District in Transition

Ostozhenka – a Moscow District in

Transition

Reflections of Post-Soviet Restructuring Processes

Cordula Gdaniec

Gdaniec, Cordula 2001: Ostozhenka – a Moscow District in Transition. Reflections

of Post-Soviet Restructuring Processes. – Ethnologia Europaea 31:2: 41–58.

The changes Moscow has been undergoing as a result of the collapse of the Soviet Union are dramatic. Social and structural change is accompanied and influenced by architectural and urban change. The tasks of the city planners include reconstruction of the historic fabric of the city as well as providing the basis for a post-modern world city. Although contradictory to an extent, these two aspects drive the discourse of urban development: heritage has become a cultural and economic commodity. As befits a capitalist city, the results of such a development include the creation of winners and losers – gentrifiers moving into restored city centre locations and ordinary citizens leaving for the high-rises on the outskirts.

Cordula Gdaniec, Institut für Europäische Ethnologie, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Schiffbauerdamm 19, D-10117 Berlin, Germany. E-mail: [email protected]

Introduction fabric, architecture, functions, and population.

“…one of the best locations in the historical Although not on the same scale as Berlin where centre of Moscow, 5 minutes walking distance to vast areas in the bombed out geographical city the Kremlin and Christ the Saviour Cathedral centre became the playground for investors and … this great location conveniently combines architects, in Moscow, too, there emerged an proximity to central Moscow business areas enormous demand for new housing and espe- with quietness, safety and favourability of Kro- cially for office and retail space. This has been potkinskaya residential district ...”(MCD Group created to a large extent in old buildings still in

2000). This is how developers describe the loca- existence in need of restoration, but also in new tion of their “high class” apartments for sale in constructions. Many debates have been going a new residential project in the heart of the on about the political, economic and social trans- Ostozhenka district. From noble yet rural ori- formation in the city, but less yet about the gins, the district declined during the Soviet transformation processes of the city itself. It is period. Residents were moving out of the city these processes which are at the same time centre into modern apartment blocks on the informed by the macro-processes of Russian outskirts while the historic buildings were left economics, politics and societal structure, but to deteriorate, housing short-term immigrant they also influence current developments. workers, or were pulled down. During the post- This article describes an ethnographic study Soviet era it has been re-discovered as a prestig- of a district in the historic centre of the Russian ious area, with developers, private investors capital to highlight developments and prob- and businesses starting to turn the district into lems in contemporary Moscow as well as to a top address for apartments and offices. contribute to understanding of urban change in Moscow during the 1990s, that is Moscow post-socialist and post-industrial societies gen- since the collapse of the Soviet Union, has been erally. The research was carried out during the undergoing dramatic changes: in the urban mid-1990s as a study at micro-level with ethno-

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graphic research methods to complement more general information about economic, social and city planning developments in Moscow.1 The findings were that while history in the city’s fabric has become a vehicle to promote a Mos- cow and a Russian identity and has become a major driving force to regenerate the city not only physically, historic architecture also has become a cultural and economic commodity. The art nouveau or older buildings in the city centre have become prestigious real estate, and new buildings more often than not reinvent a historic style in post-modern fashion. Parts of the city centre are becoming gentrified by a new upper (middle) class of the business elite with residential and office buildings, and also with western luxury supermarkets, boutiques and Map 1: Central Moscow and location of Ostozhenka. restaurants. As a result, facing a move out of the city centre into now less modern apartment blocks continues to be a reality for a considera- mercial, retail and services, administrative and ble part of the local population. cultural. They are mainly located along the The city centre represents at once historicity edges of the district but also within it, giving it of post-Soviet Russian culture, identity even, a diverse character. This pattern has evolved and the inner circle of the powers that be. It has over centuries and the current redevelopment become more exclusive through prohibitive plan for the area envisages retaining this mix of prices in shops and venues and of rents or functions: the district is to stay residential, with private apartments, while cheap markets and commercial and office establishments along its low-cost housing persist and expand on the city edge, especially along Ostozhenka street. fringes. Although the end of the model communist city has heralded a re-opening of public Manufacturing and Commercial space within the city, these places are either Tekstil, the textile factory with research and dedicated to the new ideologies of consumerism teaching facilities, successor of a 19th century and/or Russian folklore and religion, or have factory, is the only manufacturing enterprise become part of new buildings with fenced in left in the district. On its premises are now a surroundings. It seems contradictory – the city BMW repair workshop and a paints retailer, (centre) has become more accessible, but it has giving the factory its necessary additional in- also created new spaces of exclusion. come through rent, and testifying to the de- creasing production capacity. Around the factory, in the southern part of Functions and Land Use within the the district, and across two-thirds of the eastern District side, new commercial enterprises have settled

Ostozhenka is the area bordering the river during the mid-1990s. These include a Trade

Moskva to the southwest of the Kremlin, oppo- Centre, a telecommunications and pagers deal- site the Red October chocolate factory, between er, car repair workshops and a stomatology metro stations Park Kultury and Kropotkin- centre as well as a large number of unidentifi- skaya and the newly constructed Cathedral of able and inconspicuous firms. This is a manifes- Christ the Saviour. The area’s predominant tation of the positive outcomes of the market function has always been residential, but it reforms: localised economic growth. It also re- includes an increasingly changing range of non- flects the contrasts being created during the residential functions: manufacturing and com- transition period: these new firms are occupy-

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ing old, run-down commercial buildings. The across the river, making an interesting new almost derelict outer appearance of the neigh- connection within the area’s alignments. Ac- bourhood does not suggest a successful new cording to the architects, their design “has dem- enterprise culture, and the contrasts between onstrated a possibility of the new building that old and new, run-down and successful, are be- ‘speaks’ the modern architectural language and coming more acute. This is a phenomenon en- nevertheless enters reasonably well into the countered across the city centre. The downside context of the historical housing” (Ostozhenka of the district is a considerable number of closed Architects 1996). enterprises, which include two publishers be- longing to now redundant Soviet institutions, Retail and Services and derelict buildings of manufacturing and Almost all shops are located on the ground warehouse character no longer displaying signs floors of the multi-storey buildings lining the of their previous function. These are witness to northern half of Ostozhenka Street. Although a by-gone era of a different political and eco- there are several new shops, the variety is nomic system, temporarily forming a reminder limited. You can buy basic groceries in three as well as anachronism. shops which are the privatised successors of This image is reinforced by the first major state shops, now stocking imported foods. There new construction project, the Moscow Interna- is also a large pharmacy at Kropotkinskaya tional Bank, juxtaposing dereliction with state- metro station which doubles as the Russian of-the-art modern office construction. Located Orthodox Church shop and houses offices of the on the embankment of the Moskva, the bank Moscow Patriarchy on the upper floors. Local backs onto industrial buildings and faces the residents have to go further, into neighbouring large 1970s modernist Central House of Artists districts, for anything that is not basic. What is

Renovated and privatised formerly Soviet fast-food restaurant on Ostozhenka. Photo: Cordula Gdaniec 1996.

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New businesses springing up on Ostozhenka and around the corner, while old buildings are being gutted. Photo: Cordula Gdaniec 1996.

well provided, though, are spare parts for cars, Administrative and Cultural sold in at least three shops along Ostozhenka The third non-residential function in this area street. can be classified as administrative/cultural. Other new establishments in Ostozhenka It includes three schools, a kindergarten, include a bank, two travel agents, two modern- three clinics, a new commercial/private stoma- ised kulinarii (Soviet fast-food restaurants) and tology centre, six buildings related to various three expensive bars/restaurants. In the future embassies, one bank head office (the Moscow redistribution of living space, if current trends International Bank), several foreign bank rep- continue, a majority of the local population will resentations, a swimming pool, indoor tennis be able to shop for groceries by car in one of the courts, a number of municipal organisations modern supermarkets, while the people em- and departments, administrative offices of var- ployed in the new offices are likely to frequent ious organisations and firms, and the office- new restaurants and use other establishments cultural complex of the “School of Operatic Art” of the modern service industry. which was built on the largest green area of the

In the commercial zone of the district, which district in the centre of Ostozhenka street. The is roughly the southern half of the district, there offices in the district belong mainly to small and are more technical and wholesale shops and medium-sized Russian firms (mainly in the services such as shops for (office) furniture, service sector or administrative offices), and parquet floors, blinds, tennis equipment and a are concentrated around the northern corner of small liquor store which has dishevelled-look- the district. ing people queuing outside towards the end of There are two functioning churches and one its lunch-time break. old, unused church building. This former church

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of the Old Believers is a listed building; as yet jump around the playgrounds. The further away there are no signs of restoration. The other two houses are from Ostozhenka Street, the more churches are the church of Elias the Prophet in we see a distinctive decrease in height, size, the northern part of the district, and the small condition and prestige. church above the main gate of Zachatevskii During the Soviet period only the Party built Convent, built in 1696. The convent was closed apartment blocks in the city centre. Nomenklat- in the early 1930s and the main church pulled ura housing is located in either these yellow down. On its foundations a secondary school blocks of flats from the 1960s to 1980s, or blocks was built which is still in use today. The small from the Stalin era, but not in restored old church was reopened a few years ago and a few buildings. In Ostozhenka the Central Commit- nuns are living in one of the dilapidated convent tee built a block of flats in the mid-1980s, set buildings dating back to the beginning of the back in large grounds behind high security 19th century. The remaining buildings in the fences. At the corner of the embankment at the convent grounds house various administrative northern end are two of the city’s most impor- offices of former state organisations. tant monuments. These are early 20th century art nouveau houses by famous architects, using Residential Land Use motifs from ancient Russian art and folklore. Redevelopment in Ostozhenka is concentrated One of them is now the administration of the on housing and offices, and geographically it is UPDK, the former state organisation responsi- in the northern third – the area that was already ble for housing foreign diplomats. Since privati- historically more prestigious. Apartments in sation, they are one of the biggest property the tenement blocks are being renovated, some owners in Moscow. of the smaller houses are being fully restored, Residential space becomes less dense, small- and part of the new space is being turned into offices. The absolute amount of residential space will probably not be reduced because most of the office space as well as some of the housing is being newly constructed. The share of office space among the overall built space, however, is likely to increase significantly. In the northern part of the district residential space takes the form of apartments in tenement blocks of various sizes. Bordering

Ostozhenka Street are five- to seven-storey buildings which either date from the end of the th 19 century, or are art nouveau tenements from the beginning of the 20th. These houses have large apartments, often with period features such as doors and staircases, and an attractive outer facade. These are among the most sought- after apartments in Moscow today, just as their equivalents are in Paris or Prague.

In the middle of the district there are smaller, one- to four-storey brick and wood buildings in various states of repair. Generally, these houses are run-down and most date from the turn of the 20th century. Even where they look fairly dilapidated, the flats are evidently occu- pied and old people sit on the benches in the green areas between the houses while children Map 2: Ostozhenka district.

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er and of lower quality towards the southern idential and non-residential use; Stalin-era end of the district. This is where commercial buildings; Brezhnev-era 15-storey, yellow brick, and administrative or cultural functions are blocks of apartments built for the nomenklatu- concentrated. Along the embankment there are ra, a concentration of which is located in Mos- almost no residential houses. The variety of cow’s most prestigious central district between functions and land use in the district is growing Prechistenka and Tverskaya streets; and, last- while economic activities that are no longer ly, the 1990s buildings which can be character- viable are being phased out. The main function ised as postmodern reconstructions. – residential – is meanwhile being consolidat- Most of these building periods are found in ed, all of which reflects the changing economic Ostozhenka: climate. However, within the housing sector of this area dramatic changes are occurring, con- 1. the historic period, which includes buildings nected with a transformation of living space up to the end of the 19th century, about 1890. into elite housing and the construction of resi- Roughly one third of the district’s buildings dential-office complexes, i.e. a mixture of func- date from this period and they are concen- tions, and a resulting shift in the population trated in the southern and inner part of the structure. area. 2. the pre-Revolutionary period, which includes

houses built roughly between 1890 and 1920. A Typology of the District’s Buildings These are mainly tenements and single dwell- For a detailed characterisation of the district a ing art nouveau houses which are concen- mapping exercise was carried out in 1997 to log trated in the northern part of the district, as type and age, condition, function and use, as well as many commercial buildings along well as prestige of all the buildings in the the embankment and in the southern part of district. The following section is an account of the district. They account for the vast major- these maps. ity of the district’s buildings.

3. the early Soviet period, which includes build- Type and Age of Buildings ings from between 1920 and 1945. These are The city planning and architectural history of few in number and are commercial/adminis- Moscow can be traced through the characteris- trative buildings combined with residential tics of buildings from particular eras and pat- functions, located in the northern half of the terns of built-up areas. In the city centre there district. are many quarters which still display a medie- 4. the post-war Soviet period, which includes val structure of small streets, small houses and an equally small number of buildings built plots of land surrounding these. The centre of between 1945 and 1991. These include ad- the Ostozhenka district, around the convent, is ministrative, sports and residential func- an example of this. Planning of the Stalin era is tions and are scattered around the district. also very obvious with its wide streets and 5. the 1990s, which includes all buildings built squares, and large, ornate grey or beige stone or reconstructed after 1991. Their number is buildings for which much of the historic fabric already larger than those built during the was sacrificed. The prime example of this is Soviet period, and growing. They include

Tverskaya Street. Individual styles of houses of office and residential functions, often com- certain eras found in Moscow’s centre include bined, and are concentrated in the northern usadby, or estates from the 18th and 19th century, part of the district. which are one- or two-storey houses in classicist form; the so-called dokhodnye doma, or tene- Condition of the Buildings ments, from the turn of the century, either in The condition of the buildings ranges from total brick or art nouveau blocks of four to seven dilapidation to excellent, and this gradation can storeys, art nouveau single residential houses, be traced geographically from the southern part constructivist buildings from the 1920s for res- of the district to the northern part as a general

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indicator. More characteristic of the district, Most of the historic buildings from the early though, is the juxtaposition of houses in very to mid-19th century were originally built as good condition with buildings marked by degra- residential houses but turned into administra- dation or next to waste grounds. Two other strik- tive buildings after the revolution. The usadba ing features are the large number of construc- on Pozharskii was transformed into a clinic in tion sites, and the run-down character of the the late 19th century. All the art nouveau houses district generally which is made worse by the were converted for administrative or foreign noise, dirt and hazards caused by the building diplomatic use in the Soviet era. Some of the work. To sum up the whole district’s condition, manufacturing and warehouse buildings from one would have to classify it as run-down with the turn of the century were turned into com- small pockets of restoration and high standards. mercial space in the Soviet or post-Soviet peri-

For the purposes of this study the condition od. The convent was transformed into a school of the houses has been divided into six catego- and offices for state institutions in the 1930s. ries: Parts of it were returned to convent use in the early 1990s, while the administrative institu- 1. derelict, including total dilapidation and very tions remain there. The cement factory was bad condition. Generally, buildings in this turned into tennis courts in the 1970s, and state are empty. today also houses an expensive restaurant, and

2. bad, including houses with dilapidated parts. on the premises of the Chaika swimming pool is

These are usually still inhabited. a small currency exchange office. 3. below average, whereby average means a The most significant change in uses is occur- satisfactory condition that could be much ring within the tenements of the turn of the improved, but poses no serious risks to the century. There is a significant increase in office users. About 40% of the district’s buildings space which is concentrated in the more pres- fall into this category. tigious northern part of the district and along

4. average, the Russian “standard” condition of Ostozhenka Street. Although many, probably

buildings, which would be classified as “bad” most, of the renovated apartments in the art in a western context. This is the second nouveau tenements have kept their residential largest category, the vast majority of build- function, an unknown, but certainly not insig- ings are either average or below in this nificant number is being turned into offices. The district. office of the Ostozhenka Architects is an exam- 5. good, or above average. This includes 1990s ple of this phenomenon: They reside in two first (re-)constructions and the Soviet party-elite floor apartments of a six-storey art nouveau

house as the only building from the Soviet tenement at the corner of Ostozhenka, but there

period. is no sign advertising their presence. 6. excellent. This includes only 1990s (re-)con- The share of office space is increasing in the structions, either single apartments in ten- district, partly at the expense of existing resi- ements or entire buildings, most of which dential space. At the same time, new residential were not actually finished at the time this space is being constructed, increasing the com- research was compiled. bination of residential and administrative uses. The complex of the School of Operatic Art in-

Functions and Uses of Buildings cludes a residential-office development which

The district is characterised by a mixture of is much larger than the school itself, in order to uses and functions, and many individual build- finance the project. One of the other new devel- ings themselves either comprise or represent a opment projects is a residential complex with a mixture of functions and uses. Many buildings kindergarten. So far, this trend is concentrated were built for a different purpose from the one in the northern, more prestigious part of the they are being used for now, or they house a district, indicating that the new housing will be range of uses which were not all envisaged at of high standard as well as high price. the time of construction. For this study the functions and uses of the

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buildings have been categorised as: new prestigious office space along Gogolevskii Bulvar and in the Prechistenka/Arbat area.

1. administrative (state and municipal organ- Another important development that can be

isations, embassies) gathered from this study is the increase of office 2. office (medium and small private firms of space in the residential sector. various description, most of which are actually located within residential houses, bank Prestige Rating of the Buildings head offices) Although in general Ostozhenka is a prestig- 3. office-housing (combined complexes, in con- ious area because of its historic character, green struction or planned) space, low density and vicinity to the city centre,

4. housing (along Ostozhenka street the first high prestige is only bestowed upon the art

floors of the residential houses are all occu- nouveau tenements in the northern corner of pied by trade and catering) the district. Prestige decreases with growing 5. housing (empty) (residential houses ear- distance from that corner and from Ostozhenka marked for reconstruction the inhabitants Street, parallel to a decrease in quality and of which have already been resettled) height of the buildings. However, there are 6. education (two secondary schools, one art many potentially very prestigious buildings school, one kindergarten) inside the district. Only the southern part with

7. trade, catering (shops, restaurants, bars, its commercial and manufacturing character

and services. The vast majority of these is has really low prestige at the moment, although located on the first floors of the residential that may change in the future if its potential as blocks along Ostozhenka street and include downtown riverside development is realised. a Sberbank branch, two hairdressers, two In order to characterise the prestige rating of restaurants, three travel agents, three gro- the district and its buildings in their current cers, two photo processing shops, a money state and their potential for developers and

exchange, a car spare parts trader, one fur- reconstruction, prestige is based upon a subjec-

niture shop, a cosmetics shop, a mobile tive judgement which takes into account the phone dealer, a fashion firm, and a book following factors: condition of the building, ar- shop.) chitecture, function, location. 8. sport, cultural (Chaika swimming pool, ten- The rating has been divided into four catego- nis courts, cultural centre, churches) ries: 9. medical (three clinics) 10. manufacturing (textile factory) 1. low prestige. These are buildings in a bad or

11. commercial (empty) (commercial, possibly degraded condition, without any particular

manufacturing, buildings from the turn of architectural merit, and/or were built for the century that are now empty and in a functions that can be reconstructed to fit very bad condition). post-industrial functions only with major effort and cost. Two different zones can be discerned: The north- 2. potential prestige. These are buildings in a ern part of the district can be classified as an bad or run-down condition which are archi- office and retail zone, while the southern part tecturally valuable, located in strategic plac- can be classified as a commercial and manufac- es near main roads and amenities, and which turing zone. In the northern part are also the could easily be adapted for modern residen- higher and more prestigious residential build- tial or office use. ings. New firms, including banks, insurance 3. prestige. These are buildings in a relatively companies and developers, tend to prefer office good state, of high architectural value and in space in this northern part in the better quality a strategic location. They are built for and buildings. This means along the main street used for functions needed today.

Ostozhenka, near the metro station (Kropotkin- 4. high prestige. These are newly (re-)construct- skaya), and close to the neighbouring zones of ed buildings, as well as renovated apart-

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ments in the art nouveau tenements, of high the part of private business and influential architectural value, excellent condition and individuals, and of the mayor’s penchant for

purpose-built for present day functions and large-scale, expressive projects.

uses: high class housing and offices. The other two small greens exist only as a result of two churches falling victim to Stalinist purges. It is interesting, thus, how spaces and Urban Policy for the Regeneration of their perception are relative to their time and the Historic Centre – Conservation and Planning context. Judging by the statements in the interviews with the Ostozhenka Architects and the During the 1980s urban conservation gradually reports on the protest movements during the gained importance within government structures glasnost years (Colton 1995), Muscovites are and attention was finally focused on Ostozhenka usually in favour of conserving their urban and when significant potential was realised. Poten- their ecological environment. tial in terms of a fairly unspoilt historic settle- The entire territory within the Garden Ring, ment structure and empty space as well as hous- the historic core of the city, is classified as an es of historic-architectural value that can be urban conservation zone. Recent new regula- transformed into quality or prestige housing. tions have dispensed with more detailed de- Although not awarded the status of a “strict” grees of strictness or “special town planning conservation regime, the district was officially regimes”. Only the Kremlin and its immediate classified as a “historically valuable area”. surroundings are still in the strictest conserva- Regardless of the increased official concern tion zone. Ostozhenka is today subject only to for urban conservation, however, valuable old the general guidelines about urban conserva- buildings were still destroyed during this peri- tion set out in the planning document for the od. This was the case with the houses in the Central Planning Zone. centre of Ostozhenka Street on the site of the On the city government’s list of hundreds of largest green area, which included a number of buildings to be reconstructed for the 850th anni- architectural monuments. In 1982, the city’s versary of Moscow, the Ostozhenka district is architecture and planning authority (GlavAPU) one object of reconstruction in its entirety. The organised a competition for the project for a new organisation responsible for this is the Prefec- building of the USSR Academy of Arts. The ture of the Central Administrative District, and space was cleared but the building was never the Ostozhenka General Directorate is the sin- constructed. In its place emerged the largest gle contractor. Sources for financing the recon- skver’ or green area of the district. Subbotniki struction are supposed to be private, the em-

(volunteers who clean the city’s spaces in be- phasis is on “attracting investors” (Moscow City tween and around the houses on Saturdays) Government 1996). were called in to plant trees and establish a simple park, but the city would not invest re- The Redevelopment Plan for the Dis- sources in maintenance or establishing paths, trict lights, benches, flower beds and the like. It is exactly this plot which was the subject of The Programme of Reconstruction and Develop- protest and dismay over a large construction ment of Microregion No.17, Ostozhenka was project. The skver’ was destroyed, evoking futile worked out on the basis of historical documen- protest from the local population who consid- tation of the area, the guidelines of the planning ered the green in spite of its shortcomings an document of the Central Planning Zone and of integral part of their neighbourhood. The dis- the urban conservation authority, as well as may was all the greater as the project was a modern architectural thought. The main con- large office-cultural-residential complex, the cepts of this programme are the preservation ‘School of Operatic Art’ which is unlikely to be of and restoration of “the historic ambience” of the use to local residents. This project is a good district, the regulation of new development by example of disregard for inclusive planning on height and functions and the maintenance of

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the traditional residential function of the dis- Selling the City trict. At the same time, the commercial, admin- Everything happening in Moscow during the istrative and cultural functions are to be devel- mid-1990s seems to have been directed towards oped along the edges of the district (Ostozhenka the 850th anniversary of the capital in Septem- Architects 1996). ber 1997, and history has become a marketing Moscow has a number of General Directo- tool to promote investment in the centre. The rates, quasi-governmental institutions with mayor intends to transform Moscow into a cap- control and facilitating functions, reminiscent ital that lacks in nothing that other world cities of Urban Development Corporations which were feature (Barry 1995 and Itogi 1996). An office in set up by the British government in the 1980s’ a restored historic building is very popular drive to regenerate the country’s inner cities among banks and other businesses. This con- through public-private partnerships. Their aim nection between economy and culture in the is to attract projects which will advance the widest sense is exploited on various levels. The regeneration process but in practical terms development in Ostozhenka is a manifestation they are duplicating the city’s architecture/ of this. The reconstruction of the historic centre planning authorities’ administrative functions. is thus driven by Soviet-style projects for a big Although municipal organisations, they are joint event on the one hand, and office construction stock companies and derive their income from for the growing business community on the commissions of projects. other. In most cases, the former is not actually

The Ostozhenka General Directorate was discernible from the latter, indicating a growing set up on the basis of, and still includes, the local merger of economic and cultural aims. This is housing maintenance committee. Apart from another similarity with western redevelopment this, however, it is not much more than an practices in addition to development agencies – extension of the city’s planning and develop- marketing of the city’s architectural and cultur- ment authorities. It aims to put the official al heritage. redevelopment plan into practice, and “the en- Because the city itself does not have the tire programme is to be implemented at the funds needed to restore all old buildings, it is expense of future investors, on the basis of forced to attract investors. Deals are made that investment contracts which cede into investors’ give the investor at least 50% of the finished ownership some of the constructed or recon- space, and the other share, or its cash equiva- structed facilities” (Moscow Investors’ Associa- lent, goes to the city. Recently, due to the diffi- tion 1996). The local residents, for example, are cult economic climate, the city has had to make referred to as numbers of families and rooms concessions to the investors, increasing their and square metres, because they only seem to share of the deals to up to 80%. Even projects become important when they need to be re- that are totally financed by the city, like Gostiny housed. Consultation with the locals is restrict- Dvor,2 are dictated by potential investors: only ed to negotiations about resettlement pro- by leasing prime office and retail space can the grammes. In this respect the agency fulfils a construction costs be recouped. In fact, more controlling function, negotiating on behalf of important than the restoration itself is the hunt the residents with the developers and checking for future tenants (Shchukin 1996). that developers do not deceive the residents. In a sense, they are actively engaged in removing Population Change one set of residents and inviting in a totally different set of residents. In their promotional Until the beginning of the 19th century, the literature, they represent themselves as part- population of the district was mainly aristocrat- ners of the developers rather than as the guard- ic or connected with the convent. As the area ians of the redevelopment plan, offering “a full became more urbanised, merchants and civil set of services” (ibid.). servants moved in and gradually came to dom-

inate the class structure by the middle of the 19th th century. In the second half of the 19 century the

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population included an increasing share of the than if the government alone were responsible middle and lower social classes. This was espe- for housing provision. cially so along Ostozhenka Street itself, where This situation offers great potential for de- apartments were rented out by merchants turned velopers and private investors who want to buy landlords who had built tenements. At the turn flats in the art nouveau tenements or other old of the century, the new bourgeoisie moved into houses in central locations. In order to become the northern part of the district, where the the owners of such an apartment they have to prestigious art nouveau tenements were built. buy every party of the kommunalka a flat of The other inhabitants of the district were mem- their own. In the tenements in the northern bers of the intelligentsia , civil servants, traders corner of the district, on the basis of observation, and artisans. A growing share of workers (was) almost half of the flats have been renovated, i.e.

3 moved in between 1914 and 1930 in the wake of bought up by New Russians or developers. A expropriation of the large apartments. In order considerable number of apartments are burnt to solve the appalling housing conditions of out or otherwise derelict and therefore vacant. workers, who were living in overcrowded hos- In Ostozhenka most of the buildings were tels, often sharing a bed with people working houses with communal flats. In fact they made different shifts, the bourgeois apartments were up over 60% of the district’s housing stock in divided up to house an entire family in each 1989 (Sotsialno…1989). A consequence of this room. This was the creation of the infamous concentration is that there is now a massive kommunalki – communal apartments. turnover of the population, spread over a rela- Virtually all the flats in the old unrestored tively short time. In 1989, at the time of the last houses in the city centre were so-called kommu- census, the number of inhabitants was about nalki. Up to six families used to live in these, 3 800, representing a steady decrease since the sharing a communal bathroom and kitchen, early Soviet period. This represents a low pop- and having one, or possibly two, rooms for them- ulation density as the district is roughly half a selves. The communal flats and housing gener- square km in size (43 ha), which would be 8 000 2 ally was a major problem throughout Soviet per km . The average population density for 2 times. In spite of massive housing construction Moscow is 10 000 per km .In the Arbat and the between the 1950s and 1980s, kommunalki Yakimanka districts it is even between 20 and have not been phased out yet and there is still 40 thousand per km2, but the Sretenka district, a serious housing shortage. The city’s declared which is in many respects similar to Ostozhen- aim to eradicate communal flats by the year ka, has an even lower population density (ca 2000 seems much more feasible, of course, in 5 000 per km2 , Mosgorkomstat 1996). It will be conjunction with the emerging housing market interesting to see whether the population in

On the quieter side streets behind the establishments for the New Russians. Photo: Cordula Gdaniec 1996.

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Ostozhenka will rise again, now that the mass their own flat and increase living space per out-migration of the 1960s to the 1980s has person, much of the central population has been stopped and a new class of people who choose to moved to the outskirts since the 1960s. Build- live in the centre has emerged. Between 1992 ings in the city centre were often pulled down and 2002, if current developments continue, rather than restored in order to modernise the possibly the whole structure of the population centre, but mostly nothing at all was done with will have changed in the area. them. The residents moved into huge apart- A mix of professions and social classes has ment blocks in new microregions around the always been sustained in this district in spite city limits. The inconvenience of the location of of the growth of the share of certain strata of the new residential districts aside, people were the population. At first it was the bourgeoisie glad to receive better housing. This was true for that increased in relative terms, then workers, those who relied on the state to provide their and in later Soviet years limitchiki,4 low- or housing, but even enterprises and later on the un-skilled immigrant workers. Thus, at the housing cooperatives, which would build better end of the Soviet period, there was a relatively and larger flats, would build on the outskirts. large share, nearly 50%, of people with second- The vacated old buildings in the city centre, ary or uncompleted secondary education in the often in a bad state of repair, were subsequently district, most of whom lived in communal flats. filled with so-called limitchiki. These are mi-

The other half of the population, with special- grant workers who came to the city to work on ised secondary or higher education was living certain projects or in certain industries because to a large extent in separate flats. Of the total of a shortage of low and unskilled workers in the population of the district, 30.9% had higher capital. Not getting a residence permit to live in education; 3.6% uncompleted higher educa- the capital indefinitely or receiving other rights tion; 19.7% had specialised secondary educa- like Muscovites immediately, these workers were tion; 32.1% had secondary education; and 13.7% restricted in their choice of residence and there- had uncompleted secondary education (Sot- fore were concentrated in the run-down blocks sialno…1989). In contrast to the large num- with communal flats. Many of these limitchiki bers of kommunalki residents, only a small managed to stay on in Moscow and even get number of the party elite lived in the 1980s themselves on the city’s or an enterprise’s hous- nomenklatura block. As a result, there was no ing lists, and now live on the outskirts them- process of social polarisation in this district selves. during the later Soviet period. Although such As a result of the out-migration of the “ordi- tendencies were visible in the city centre as a nary” population of the centre the proportion of whole and in certain districts in particular, as the nomenklatura increased. Trushchenko rec- for example the Arbat, where the party elite ognised this development as a Soviet form of built many residential houses during the 1970s gentrification (oburzhuazivanie) which is not and 1980s. based on any economic or market forces charac- In at least the northern, most prestigious, teristic for gentrification (Trushchenko 1995: part of the district this is now changing due to 86). The influx of a low status, poor, marginal- the replacement of the mixed population by ised population effected a simultaneous down- New Russians. With their wealth and business ward spiral of the centre, which Trushchenko occupations they constitute a diametrically op- terms proletarianisation (proletarizatsiya) posed social class to the original inhabitants, (Trushchenko 1995: 95). These completely op- leading to a process of social polarisation. At the posing developments did not occur in exactly the moment, however, this is only a trend. The same areas, but can be found very near each absolute number of inhabitants and buildings other. The nomenklatura housing and other in the district is so small that the presence of party or army buildings would always stand out. New Russians is relatively significant, although Within Ostozhenka there have been all three small in absolute terms. developments: remaining mixed population,

In the drive to provide every family with influx of limitchiki, and nomenklatura build-

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ing. The current influx of a new elite is thus not the Northeast, not far outside the city. Accord- a totally new phenomenon. However, the qual- ing to her, the residents had some choice as to ity of the developments is different and new. It their new abode, but could not refuse offers is a direct result of the introduction of the endlessly, because in the end, they would be market economy, now that the state has lost its rehoused. Olga requested and received a flat monopoly on the distribution of living space, near a metro station along the red line which and shaped by free market forces and a laissez- serves Kropotkinskaya metro station, because faire approach by the city government regard- she is still working in this area. Apart from the ing urban policy. travelling time and cost, she is not satisfied Another characteristic of the original central with the quality of the new house, although the population is age. As younger families, people of quality of life is much better in a separate flat working age, were the first to move to better with its own bathroom and kitchen. On the housing on the outskirts, it was increasingly the whole, though, she regards the developments in elderly and single who stayed behind. In 1989, the district as positive. 19.5% of Ostozhenka’s population was aged In fact, all the people remaining in commu- over 60, while children up to six years old nal flats in Ostozhenka are living in anticipa- accounted for only 11%, 7–16 year olds for tion of being rehoused. At the moment, the fact 12.2%, and 17–59 year olds for 57% (Sotsial- that they are being forced out of a prestigious no…1989). With the influx of younger and mid- central area is of less consequence than the fact dle aged working professionals, likely to be that they receive individual flats and improves married, and possibly even with a child, this age their standard of living. Maybe they are just structure and household size are about to change resigned to the inevitable. The socio-economic fundamentally. study of the district in 1989 showed that 62.2% The population in this district is currently at of the residents wished to stay in the wider a very interesting point – on the verge of funda- district (the then administrative district Lenin- mental shifts in composition and structure. skii raion) 13.3% wanted to live in the centre or

There are many empty residential houses await- “good” outer districts (such as Rechnoi Vokzal, ing reconstruction whose original inhabitants Strogino, the Southwest), and 24.5% did not have been resettled in new apartments on the express a wish regarding their future resi- outskirts. By the time the new residents arrive, dence. According to the researchers many of the after the houses may have been newly built residents “simply do not believe that their wish- rather than restored, there will be no link be- es will in any way be considered”. tween the old and the new. Across the district Although these ‘forced emigrants’ gain an and across the years there is more continuity as advantage in terms of their housing situation, original residents continue to live in the district the profits gained by the new residents of the while more and more new residents are moving city centre seem incomparably greater, espe- into the district. However, these two sets of cially seen in the long term, and reflect the inhabitants do not mix, barely do they even social injustices being created in the wake of the meet on the street or the staircase. Yet they transition to a free market system. The centre know of each other’s existence and the original simply is prestigious for those who value the population is only too well aware of the develop- architectural environment and access to cultur- ments. Eventually they, too, will have to move al and other facilities. Among residents of the out and a new class of residents will gradually centre generally, more than 50% want to live take over the district and change its character specifically in the centre, and only 10% prefer by their different demands and standards. the outer districts with modern housing. It is those residents who are better educated and Centrification, Moscow-Style better off, for example living in separate apart- Olga used to live in a kommunalka in one of the ments, who have a stronger wish to stay in the art nouveau tenements, sharing with three oth- centre. The newcomers, limitchiki, move to the er families. In spring 1996, she was rehoused in outer districts more willingly. The socio-eco-

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nomic study for the redevelopment plan con- the new residents in Ostozhenka are in fact cludes in its recommendations that it is “neces- living differently. Money in abundance has nev- sary to support the residential functions within er been so available outside the Party nomen- the historic city centre”. klatura or so useful, since the revolution. Even In an attempt to defend the rights of older, or when people were able to save in the USSR, native (korennye) Muscovites to remain in the they were not able to spend their money due to city centre, the City Duma passed a law on shortages in the production of consumer servic- compensation and subsidies in July 1996. Native es and the restrictions on foreign travel. residents will be offered either compensation for In western cities gentrification tends to oc- the central apartment they have to give up or cur in areas largely inhabited by a marginal- subsidies in order to buy a restored apartment in ised population which results in stark con- the centre instead. This money is supposed to trasts. In Moscow there has been a more subtle come out of the city’s budget. A justification for form of socio-spatial segregation so that most this expense is that the new ruling will make it districts have been characterised by a social easier for developers to go ahead with recon- mix. Even those districts with a high share of struction projects. Drawn-out negotiations about workers and low prestige, such as the south- resettlement of the inhabitants of houses to be east of Moscow, did not become as degraded as reconstructed are discouraging potential devel- the “problem estates” on the outskirts or in the opers, and the failure to reconstruct houses is in inner cities of many western cities. A reason for the long term more expensive for the city than this was, in simple terms, the Soviet centralised investing now in the speeding up of the recon- system, where everybody lived in similarly bad struction process. However, the success of the conditions and only the party elite lived in areas new law still depends on the type of contracts the that were markedly better and segregated. The city manages to agree with the developers. present gentrifiers in Moscow thus represent a What is happening in parts of Ostozhenka high-end stream of population which contrasts and other districts of the city centre is a process sharply with the emerging poverty, but also of gentrification: high-income residents are continues the social mix of a residential quarter moving into restored or newly-built houses in a in Moscow. It seems contradictory that at the run-down area, thereby, if not replacing, then moment there is no significant middle class in marginalising the original population and Russia or even in Moscow, but still there is less changing the character of the area. The basic pronounced polarisation in residential areas. underlying economic causes of gentrification Everything indicates, though, that this will not are the same in Moscow as in western cities, continue for much longer. Because a mortgage where the phenomenon was first described – system is only in the early stages of develop- upgrading of the existing buildings with ensu- ment in Russia, even the emerging, “new”, pro- ing high rents or purchasing prices denying the fessional middle class who are now earning original population access to the restored apart- relatively well with wages of about $1000–1500 ments. Often gentrification of this type was per month, cannot afford to improve their living preceded, and is accompanied by, a ‘symbolic situation in ways similar to the options of the gentrification’ (Lang 1998) and a certain con- New Russians, or the western middle class. sumer culture and ambience, transforming the Once this group of the population has the means entire quarter, not just the buildings or apart- to buy or rent a flat in a location of their choice ments, with a certain style and atmosphere. – for example in the expanding, environmental- This also means that the gentrifiers are not ly desirable high-rise district Mitino – then necessarily rich but bring in and exploit certain more distinct socially and qualitatively differ- symbolic and cultural values in the district. entiated areas will emerge within the city. These are often artists, people working in the With the emergence of the New Russians a creative industries, students or people with new type of consumer culture is emerging. This

“alternative” lifestyles (Zukin 1982). This as- is characterised by western influence and is pect is missing completely in Moscow. However, largely limited to the small financial elite. It

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Renovation of art-nouveau tenements next to postmodern office constructions. Photo: Cordula Gdaniec 1996.

consists mainly of expensive bars and restau- point. Polarisation exists in Ostozhenka in the rants, supermarkets, specialist shops and casi- sense that the two extremes of the social and nos. In the Ostozhenka district two expensive income continuum exist next to each other. The establishments have opened that cater for this broad middle of this continuum still exists along- new class: the Tren-Moss Bistro on Ostozhenka side, and is in numbers much larger than espe- near the cathedral, and le Chalet restaurant on cially the emerging top end of the scale. Present Korobeinikov between the tennis courts and trends indicate, however, that the top end will the commercial district. This “Swiss cuisine” expand its presence in the district (and the restaurant highlights the emerging contrasts whole city centre) and gradually replace the in the district. It is surrounded by some of the current middle. The middle will also change its most run-down buildings of the district, its composition and divide into an upper middle customers arrive in BMWs, the American chef stratum, leaving more marginalised people in allegedly has the beef flown in from the USA increasing poverty. A renovated apartment with (Parks 1996), while further up the alley elderly 129 m2 in one of the art nouveau tenements on locals can be seen sifting through the rubbish Ostozhenka was for sale for $160 000 in 1996. containers. Still further up, on Ostozhenka, The rent for a three- to four-room flat in this locals are trying to make ends meet in the building before refurbishment and privatisa- grocer’s shops which are stocking goods that are tion is about $50 per month. If privatised and up to 90% imported. rented out, such a flat costs between $800 and The polarisation and gentrification process- $900 a month even if not very well renovated. es occurring throughout Moscow’s centre and Considering the officially recorded average within the Ostozhenka district represent trends monthly income of $65 for Muscovites in 1994 rather than abrupt, large-scale changes at this (Mosgorkomstat 1996), one must conclude that

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the original inhabitants, and people with mod- we see a lively Moscow in which the characters est incomes, are de facto excluded from the engage, encounter problems or enjoy themselves. regenerated centre. In the Moscow of the New Russians, the apart-

This process of gentrification has resulted in ments are mere property and investment and a high degree of fragmentation within the city their lives are unrelated to Moscow as they are space and a creeping privatisation of space. lived almost exclusively inside buildings of a Reconstructed buildings and blocks form pock- type that could be found anywhere. They avoid ets within the old city centre which contrast the “real” Moscow of the majority of citizens and with the more or less run-down character of the probably do not even know or remember it. surrounding area. Often these new buildings have delineated their private space in a very Conclusions clear and also very secure way in order to exclude those who are not part of this new Meanwhile, in 2001, several of the district’s new society. In this way, the reconstructed expensive developments and restorations have been com- apartments and offices form their own, private, pleted, adding some important new neighbours encapsulated city space that is physically, so- on the block, such as the UN Headquarters in cially and economically on a totally different Russia. Many of the offices and apartments are level of the city. The development of the School still up for sale or rent, though, while yet more of Operatic Art on the former skver is a case in are under construction. The enthusiastic cli- point. What used to be public space has, in the mate of property speculation with large-scale name of redevelopment, been turned into pri- projects and high prices of the early 1990s has vate space. It is an example of what Short has given way to more sobriety, even bankruptcy in called the “new enclosure movement” of the some cases. The number of customers for this postmodern city (Short 1996:32). top level of property was over-estimated. On a Taking all these pockets of reconstruction for more mundane level of economic activity, the the wealthy together, a ‘new’ central Moscow developments observed in 1997 have continued: emerges that is far removed from the ‘old’ Mos- there are more small computer firms (repairs, cow which is still characterised by historic build- sales), underlining the establishing of a city and ings and ‘native‘ inhabitants. In his film, “Hello a society oriented towards the new service in- Fools!” (1996), the Russian director Eldar Rya- dustry, while dereliction and closure persist. zanov depicts this gentrification process in cen- Although urban conservation has taken up a tral Moscow as background to, and part of, the higher place in the hierarchy of city planning storyline. The specific example used in the film issues it remains an issue that more often than is Ostozhenka No. 3, a grand art nouveau tene- not is put back behind more pragmatic consid- ment at the northern corner of the district. erations. In a letter to The Moscow Times a There is serious restoration work going on in reader recounts his vain attempt to fight for the the house; some apartments have already been professional restoration of an art nouveau apart- restored by New Russians, who have decorated ment house on Ostozhenka in 1995. His efforts their flats with the most expensive materials led him to discover that such buildings were and furniture in a neo-classical style (or kitsch); often not registered as architectural monuments and there are unrenovated flats that are inhab- because of “pressure from business interests”, ited by “ordinary” Muscovites. In the film, the or the documents about their registration were

Novye Russkie are followed to their place of not found or changed, and that “bribery was work, to all sorts of biznes in other luxurious wide-spread” (The Moscow Times 2001). renovated apartments, and on their encounters In a sense, this lack of respect for history and with shady businessmen and their bodyguards. architecture is part of the architectural re- The hero of the film, living in an unrenovated design of the city. Whereas in the Soviet era flat and working for the municipal services, has history was re-written through the demolition to fight off real-estate agents who try to per- of pre-revolutionary architecture and construc- suade/coerce him to sell his flat. Following him, tion of socialist ideas, history is now re-written

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more literally with pre-revolutionary buildings a minimal consumption culture in the same being converted or completely recreated in the area. These remain isolated in the sense that case of churches. There is a definition of a new there are no rows of trendy bars, restaurants or

Moscow being created through a particular use shops. The handful of expensive bars and res- of architecture – for economic as well as for taurants in Ostozhenka make no impact on the political purposes. As before, and as always, the environment of the neighbourhood, unlike the combination of past and future is a difficult, at increasing number of renovated apartments times controversial, task for those who want to and offices in former apartments. This differ- shape the city. But a task that is at the top of ence, in spite of the similarities to western cities every city’s agenda. Mayor Luzhkov is return- in terms of the transition to post-industrial ing something to the citizens that has been economics, is probably rooted in the Soviet his- missing in the model communist city and is at tory of the city and the fact that the houses in the same time trying to leave his mark in the district were not originally built for factory modelling Moscow as a postmodern world city. workers but for gentry and intelligentsia, and it Apart from the political discourse on restor- retained a village-like atmosphere well into the ing Moscow’s cultural heritage there is also a 20th century. particular marketing discourse of the newly constructed apartments and offices. Apparent- ly contradictory qualities are making the prop- Notes erties valuable and attractive. For example, 1. Sources of this research were: planning docu- they have to be in a quiet location yet within ments and city statistics, observations (mapping easy reach or proximity to bustling cultural or of the district), interviews with experts and with business life, they have to feature a historic local residents, background documentation and ambience if not in the building itself then in the other materials about the district kindly made available by Ostozhenka Architects. The research district, and also modern conveniences. Os- was carried out between 1995 and 1998, the sur- tozhenka seems to combine these well, especial- vey of the district’s buildings in the summer of ly with its leafy lanes and large corpus of resi- 1997. 2. Gostiny Dvor, originally a 19th century trade hall dential space. If you are looking for an office or an apart- which had fallen into a state of complete disrepair, has been restored into a historic-21st century ment to buy or to rent in Moscow you will find shopping mall for expensive, specialist shops, bou- Ostozhenka in the “expensive” section of the tiques and cafés. real estate agents. Most, if not all, of the new 3. New Russians (novye russkie) is a colloquialism properties are classified as “luxury”, “high class” for the new class of rich, mostly very rich, Russians who managed to acquire wealth during the first or “elite” and feature security. Comparing this years after the collapse of the Soviet Union when to the days of the late 1980s until 1990s, when state-owned firms and property was being priva- there was a squat on Ostozhenka, the district tised, or through quick and adept exploitation of seems well on the way to sanitation and gen- new economic opportunities. 4. Limitchiki was the term for immigrant, low-skilled, trification. Gentrification of a different type labour for the city’s factories during the Soviet from that in western cities, though. In Berlin, period, who were not given Moscow residence for example, the process was initiated by young permits (propiska) and most of whom had to live in “alternative” and/or creative people who moved a marginalised state for a long time or until they into disused workers’ houses, bringing in more left Moscow again. culture than money. They revitalised the old features and atmosphere which had been pushed References into oblivion during the modernisation frenzy of the 1960s and 1970s. Barry, E. 1995: ‘City of Dreams’.In: The Moscow Times In Ostozhenka, as in comparable other dis- (4 March), Insight: pp. 1–3. Colton, T. 1995: Moscow: Governing the Socialist Me- tricts in Moscow, there is no such “symbolic” tropolis, Harvard University Press: Cambridge, MA. gentrification with a concomitant consumer and Itogi 1996: Special issue about new directions in

urban development in Moscow, 6 October. social culture, but an influx of high earners with

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Lang, B. 1998: Mythos Kreuzberg. Ethnographie eines Ostozhenka Architects 1996: Fate of a Neighbour- Stadtteils 1961–1995. Frankfurt/M. hood, Ostozhenka. Between the Past and the Future, Letter, 15. June. http://www.themoscowtimes.com/sto- brochure: Moscow. ries/2001/06/15/009.html Parks, B. 1996: Le Chalet. In: The Moscow Tribune 10. MCD Group 2000: Zachatevsky 9 Project Information August: 22. (www.mcd-group.co.ru/zachatevsk_EN.html) Shchukin, A. 1996: ‘O prodazhe nado dumat pered Moscow City Government 1996: Utochenny perechen nachalom stroitelstva’. In: Kommersant Daily: 20 obektov kompleksnoi programmy stroitelstva i re- July, p. 12. Short, J.R. 1996: The Urban Order. An introduction to konstruktsii obektov v 1996–97 gg. po podgotovke k prazdnovaniyu 850–letiya osnovaniya Moskvy. K cities, culture and power. Cambridge, MA.

postanovleniyu Pravitelstva Moskvy ot 26 marta Sotsialno-ekonomicheskii i sotsiologicheskii analiz. 1996g., No. 255. Background research for the redevelopment plan of Mosgorkomstat 1996: Moskovskii statisticheskii ezhe- Microregion No.17, Ostozhenka, 1989. Ostozhenka godnik 1994. Architects. Moscow Investors’ Association, 1996: Moskva – ucha- Trushchenko, O.E. 1995: Prestizh Tsentra. Gorod- stnik MIPIM 1996. skaya sostial’naya segregatsiya v Moskve. Moscow. The Moscow Times 2001: Save Architectural Treas- Zukin, S.1982: Loft Living: Culture and Capital in ures Before it’s too Late. Urban Change. Princeton, NJ.

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