Bank of Moscow office | Alex Kuzmin

The building on Kuznetsky most street was built at the end of the XIXth century. It is the one of the Moscow historical places and you can find mentions about this building in some popular and historical books. At the very beginning many years ago, the famous Tretyakov Trading House was located here, th project belonged to the famous architect, A.S. Kaminsky. Later, in this boulding had been located the bank of Lyon Credit and Datsiaro shop which offered its visitors different kinds of art and paintings. Today on the 3rd floor and the mansard of this building is located one of the offices of Bank of Moscow. And I developed the design project for it. This building has a very interesting feature - a unique structure. In the central part of the floor there is a large premise, with the direct entrance from the first floor. Right and left wings consist of some rooms.This peculiarity gave me the main creative idea for design of this project: to place a client zone in this large hall , and in the wings - the premises for staff back office. In my project order I had the one important point - client area of the bank should be particularly respectable, luxury but rigorous and similar in design with the premises on the first and second floors. However, I didn't want to use the familiar classical technique, so I selected traditional materials - oak and marble, which I decided to use in more modern style, but referring to the pseudo-Russian style, which was typical for the architecture of the building. Wood was the only material for walls and ceilings decoration. Drawing for wall panels, I borrowed from studying of elements of the historic facades. The scheme of the ceiling was created in response to the walls drawing. For example, the central hall has the shape of a hexagon, there are no windows here, then the light was decided to organize in the form, resembling a diamon, setting in the ceiling the stained -glass window. For client zone all components of design were made by special order: high wooden doors with glass, stained -glass windows, chandeliers, oak paneling and ceilings, marble floors. Interior consists of the most modern furniture premium class with different hightech devices. In each wing originally there were three large halls, connected together with a wide and high apertures, due to what these halls looked like a single space. This interesting solution I would like to keep in my design project, and all necessary zones for staff to divide by glass. So openings turned into a beautiful glazed wooden arches. Halls decoration was made in corresponding with the classical style - with modelled ceilings and walls decorated with moldings. According to the project from the client zone goes wide wooden plinth, which continues the style. On the floor in the both wings were suggested to put an interesting carpet, in the style of the famous theatrical Dyagilesky seasons, however, the Client decided to to put one-colour carpet. Rooms for staff are equipped with modern furniture and lighting systems. The second level of the bank is located in the mansard . Mansard in this building was never used, that's why I decided not to refer the design project to the history and create a high tech, comfortable and mordern office. The mansard itself is quite large, but has windows only on one side, and the sun's rays penetrate to other areas only through small attic windows. Therefore, during the design developing there was a very important task — open the way for the light, this goal was reached by creating an open space, as well as a choice of furniture in white color (from the collection of the Swiss company Vitra). This open space is a work place for a large number of employees, that's why it was very important to make it more comfortable using sound-absorbing materials. Mansard ceiling is made with acoustic, fire resistant panels, covered with birch veneer sheet. In accordance to my project, this level consists of three zones: Admin, Retail Division and Division for Small and Medium Business. The Admin zone should be a universal premise, which can be used as a meeting room, a conference hall and a room for trainings. It is installed with glass walls with convertible mechanisms, for easy modifing the structure of the zone. Also there I put the waiting area with large sofas. In the other two departments the space is divided by glass partitions or shelving units.