After the war (1944-1950)
La arquitectura de la posguerra, a veces percibida como de un estilo uniforme, se fragmentó en al menos cuatro vectores de desarrollo:.
La construcción residencial en la posguerra fue segregada según los inquilinos. No se hizo ningún esfuerzo para ocultar los lujos; a veces eran evidentes, a veces deliberadamente exagerados (en contraste con la simple Casa del Embankment") de Iofan). Las residencias de los funcionarios de Stalin estaban en el nivel superior; así fue la Casa de los Leones de 1945 de Ivan Zholtovsky (la Casa de los Leones fue diseñado por Nikolai Gaigarov y M.M. Dzisko del taller de Zholtovsky. Zholtovsky supervisó y promovió el proyecto), una lujosa residencia en el centro para los mariscales del Ejército Rojo"). Los apartamentos para los generales diseñados en 1947 por Lev Rudnev, en el mismo bloque, tiene una disposición exterior menos extravagante. Había un tipo de edificio para cada rango de la jerarquía de Stalin.[15].
Los edificios de clase alta pueden ser fácilmente identificados por detalles como el espaciamiento entre ventanas, los áticos y las bay windows. A veces, el rango relativo y la ocupación de los inquilinos está representada por adornos, a veces por placas conmemorativas. Se ha de tener en cuenta que todas esas eran las características de Moscú. En las ciudades más pequeñas, la élite social generalmente comprendía sólo una o dos clases; San Petersburgo siempre tuvo una oferta de residencias de lujo de la época prerrevolucionaria.
Volga-Don Canal (1948-1952)
Construction of the Volga-Don Canal, designed by Sergey Zhuk's Hydroproject Institute, began before the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945, which would disrupt the process. During 1948-1952 construction was completed. Navigation began on June 1, 1952. The canal and its facilities were built predominantly by prisoners, who were detained in several specially organized corrective labor camps. During 1952 the number of convicts employed by construction exceeded 100,000.
Underground metro (1938-1958)
The first stage of the Moscow Metro (1931-1935) began as a city transportation service. There was a lot of propaganda about its construction, but the subway itself was not perceived as propaganda. "Unlike other projects, the Moscow Metro was never named Stalin's metro."[16] The old architects[17] avoided commissions on the metro. Attitudes changed when work on the second stage began in 1935. This time, the metro was a political statement and enjoyed much better funding.[18] The second stage produced such different examples of Stalinist style as the Mayakovskaya (1938), Elektrozavodskaya and Partizanskaya (1944) stations.
It took 6 years to complete the first post-war metro line (a 6.4 km section of the ring line). These stations were dedicated to Victory. The Comintern metro station was renamed Kalininskaya in December 1946), the Park Kultury-Koltsevaya station featured real Gothic chandeliers, another exit. Metrostroy operated its own marble and carpentry factories, producing 150 solid marble columns for this short section. The second section of the ring line was a tribute to heroic work (with the exception of Shchusev's Komsomolskaya, set to recount Stalin's speech of November 7, 1941).[19]
On April 4, 1953, the public learns that the section from the Alexandrovsky Sad station, later called Kalininskaya, to Kievskaya is closed forever and replaced by a new deep alignment line. There is no official explanation for this costly change; all speculations refer to a bomb shelter function. One of the stations, Leonid Polyakov's Arbatskaya (2), became the longest station in the system, 250 meters instead of the standard 160, and probably the most extravagant. "To a certain extent, it is the Petrine baroque of Moscow, but despite the citations of historical legacy, this station is hyperbolic, ethereal and unreal."[20].
The Stalinist canon was officially condemned when two other sections, Luzhniki and VDNKh, were being built. These stations, completed in 1957 and 1958, were mostly stripped of excess, but architecturally they still belong to Stalin's lineage. The date of May 1, 1958, when the last of these stations opened, marks the end of all late Stalinist construction.
"Seven Sisters" (1947-1955)
In 1946 Stalin had the idea of building many skyscrapers in Moscow, which led to a decree in January 1947 and the beginning of a six-year advertising campaign. At the time of the official opening, September 1947, eight construction sites were identified (the Eighth Sister, in Zaryadye, would be cancelled). Eight design teams, led by the new generation of chief architects (aged 37 to 62), produced numerous projects; there was neither open competition nor evaluation committee, an indicator of Stalin's personal management.
All the main architects received Stalin Prizes in April 1949 for preliminary blueprints; followed by corrections and amendments until very late stages of completion. All buildings were steel frames with concrete forms and masonry walls, supported by concrete foundations (which sometimes required ingenious water retention technologies).
Skyscraper projects required new materials (especially ceramics) and technologies; The solution to those problems contributed to later housing and infrastructure development. However, it came at the cost of stopping regular construction, at a time when the country was in ruins. The cost of this project on real urban needs can be judged from these numbers:
Similar skyscrapers were built in Warsaw, Bucharest and Riga; the tower in kyiv was completed without a crown and bell tower.
The rise of skyscrapers, publicized since 1947, was recreated by numerous smaller buildings across the country. The 8- to 12-story towers marked the 4- to 5-story complexes of postwar regional centers. The Central Pavilion of the All-Russian Exhibition Center, reopened in 1954, is 90 meters high, has a cathedral-like main hall, 35 meters high, 25 meters wide with Stalinist sculptures and murals.[22].
The double towers, which flank the city's main squares, can be found from Berlin to Siberia:
Stalin's skyscrapers
The Stalin Skyscrapers (Russian: ) are a group of seven Moscow skyscrapers designed in the Stalinist era. The English nickname for these skyscrapers is the "Seven Sisters." They were officially built from 1947 to 1953, in a complex combination of Russian Baroque and Gothic styles with the same contemporary technology used in the construction of skyscrapers in the United States.
The seven buildings are: Hotel Ukraina, the Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Apartments, the Kudrinskaya Square building, the Leningradskaya Hotel, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the main building of Moscow State University, and the Red Gates Administrative Building.
Independence Avenue in Minsk (1944-1959)
The urban architectural ensemble of Nezalezhnastci Avenue in Minsk is an example of the integrated approach to the organization of a city's environment by harmoniously combining its architectural monuments, planning structure, landscape and places of natural or artificial vegetation. The Complex was built during the fifteen years after the Second World War. Its length is 2900 meters. The width of the road, including sidewalks, varies from 42 to 48 meters.
Work on the general layout of the former Sovietskaya Street began in 1944, shortly after the liberation of Minsk from Nazi troops. Leading architects from Moscow and Minsk took part in the project. In 1947, as a result of the competition, the project that had been developed under the supervision of academician of architecture M. Parusnikov, was selected for implementation.
The project plan for the Nezalezhnastci Avenue complex is a good example. The design provided the main characteristics of the urban complex: the length of the building facades, their silhouettes, the main divisions and the general architectural pattern. The integrated construction plan was based on hosting innovative ideas with classical architecture. Pre-war buildings and park areas were incorporated into the architectural ensemble.
Currently, the buildings that make up the Nezalezhnastci Avenue complex are registered in the State List of Historical and Cultural Values of the Republic of Belarus. The architectural ensemble itself, with its buildings and structures, design and landscape, is protected by the state and inscribed on the List as a complex of historical and cultural values. In 1968 a National Prize for Architecture was introduced which was won by a team of architects representing the Moscow and Minsk schools of architecture (M.Parusnikov, G.Badanov, I.Barsch, S.Botkovsky, A.Voinov, V.Korol), S.Musinsky, G.Sisoev, N.Trachtenberg and N.Shpigelman) for the design and construction of the Nezaleznosci ensemble Avenue.[23].
The most famous Stalinist architectural ensembles in Minsk are also on Lenina Street, Kamsamolskaya Street, Kamunistychnaya Street, Pryvakzalnaya Square and others.
Reconstruction of kyiv (1944-1955)
Central kyiv was destroyed during World War II when the Red Army abandoned the city and used remote explosives to detonate bombs and deny them to German forces. After the liberation of kyiv, the streets and squares of the city were cleared of ruins. Symbolically (as a commemoration of Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the USSR) on June 22, 1944, the City Soviet organized a competition for architects from kyiv and elsewhere in the republic and the union to develop a new project for the complete reconstruction of the central city.
Stalin Prize of 1949
The Stalin Prize of 1949, announced in March 1950, showed a clear and current division of Stalinist architecture: extravagant and luxurious buildings were still praised, but so were attempts to make the Stalinist style affordable. The 1949 award was awarded exclusively to completed apartment buildings, a sign of priority. It also demonstrates the class stratification of eligible tenants at this time. Three Moscow buildings received awards:.