The hero of a Russian film said: "At home, as people, relatives and friends, can tell a lot about their owners." But even the owners can tell a lot about their homes, especially if the owner is an architect. Tells Natalia Guseva. "I was born in Moscow on Krasnaya Presnya and I remember well the old Moscow courtyards with wooden houses and dovecotes. As a child, I painted a lot, especially loved the roofs of old houses, which were visible from my window. I still see the picture: early spring, sun , the sky and the roofs of houses with dovecotes, cooing birds pecking millet on my windowsill ... I feed them, and while they peck, I draw them ...

Parents, I am grateful for the fact that they helped me make the right choice and not lose myself. My father taught me to think constructively and really perceive life. Mom, a creative person, worked as an art historian and from an early age developed an artistic vision in me. At the insistence of my mother, I graduated from art school, but I did not hurry to follow in her footsteps. Loving animals to oblivion, I spent many years at the station of young naturalists, dreamed of becoming a veterinarian. Mom was able to dissuade me, and I did not become a veterinarian. But love for animals remained, and now Chung's cat and his sister Chang live in my house.

I decided to live outside the city a long time ago - when I got married and gave birth to my eldest daughter. (I have three children in total, the younger ones are boys, one is 7 years old, another is 4 years old.) Then it became clear that the family needed a home. And the house in the country, and that necessarily with a fireplace and second floor. It is now such thoughts seem the most banal, but then, under socialism, it was almost unreal.

We were looking for this house for two or three years (I don’t remember, it was so long ago). And found. The house was already ready (then the land without a house was not for sale). I was struck by the place, the relief of the site and the house standing on the slope.

The interior was very organic, grew like grass in a field. Some objects immediately found a place for themselves, others wandered around the house for a long time, until they found their refuge, others still travel. They, like me, are in the search process. The interior lives and grows with us. And it is no coincidence that the furniture in the house is old - it gives a sense of kinship between generations, a living connection with the roots. Most of the furniture I inherited. Round chair - from the husband's parents. And behind the old dressing table, which stands in the bathroom, my great-grandmother was still pissed. Our furniture, as in the tales of Andersen, can tell more than one interesting story. For example, only I know where the handle disappeared from the box of the fighter, and for what reason a piece of wood fell off on the side of the sideboard. But let it remain our family secret ... A small old sofa lives in the office, it is on it that the most interesting ideas come to my mind. Antique furniture has to creativity. Maybe because earlier the furniture was cut out only by hand and still keeps the warmth of the hands of the people who made it? Things and children's toys we have to match the furniture. For example, a bear - even before the war. We also have modern furniture, but in style it is close to the old one. For example, we put Belarusian pine furniture in our daughter’s room, and I myself covered it with a blue transparent lacquer. We bought a bed for our bedroom with my husband when we entered this house, and deliberately chose a modern one. I believe that this thing is sacred and therefore should belong to only one owner. "