apartment with a total area of ​​86 m2 Oleg Ustinov, Anna Nikolskaya

Passing the gallery

A photo: Karen Manko

Stylist: Anna Subbotina

Text: Nikita Gorchakov

Architect: Oleg Ustinov, Anna Nikolskaya

Magazine: N1 (90) 2005

Oleg Ustinov received an artistic education and with alma mater milk absorbed the axiom that all shades of blue and violet are the essence of cold colors. And then he built an apartment, where warm and living space grew out of these colors in combination with the same theoretically icy minimalism. It's all about the third ingredient - natural wood, which is in abundance here. On the floor - a capricious larch, which is submitted not by every cabinetmaker. The walls are finished with light oak floorboard. Ustinov with the customer specifically decided not to process it in order not to fall into banality. The podium in the hall is also an oak, but here it is already covered with dark varnish. In the bedroom wallpaper hung with the texture of the mat. The tree is even in the bathroom, where it would seem to be contraindicated due to high humidity. But no: the artist takes a tick, which, as you know, so well tolerates moisture, which is used as the main material when finishing decks on yachts. It seems as if the warm breath of the tree neutralized the arctic ice of glass, which is the second main material used in the decoration of this apartment. All the doors, most of the horizontal surfaces and even some wall panels, for example in the kitchen, are made of glass here. The part of the partition separating the living room from the corridor is also made of transparent material. There is not a single non-rectangular element here, but nevertheless, the place does not at all cause boredom by either the excessive stiffness of simple lines or the excessive familiarity of games with geometry. Everything in moderation, as in any truly exclusive and expensive things. Oleg Ustinov, the head of the Amos Project bureau, worked on this apartment together with the architect Anna Nikolskaya. Oleg was responsible for the selection of materials and details, and Anna - for the layout and the overall concept of the interior. Anna told us in a telephone interview that she wanted to put in the apartment "new functions that people were not used to living with." For example, a podium that visually divides the space of the kitchen-living room into three different zones and is the center of the room. The kitchen can be accessed only by circling this podium. According to Anna, this was done deliberately, so that the customer would often walk through a small apartment in general. Anna recalls: “My concept was rigorous and mathematically verified, and Oleg introduced many asymmetrical elements in it, such as pylons around the plasma panel, multi-level lights above the bar or a niche in the wall of the corridor. ".Oleg Ustinov: "We wanted to make an apartment that will not only correspond to the lifestyle of its owner, but also remain relevant even after fifty years."