Albina Nazimova decorates restaurants similar to living rooms in a respectable house; makes casinos unlike casinos; sports clubs that can be easily confused with the photo gallery. And she says that she does all this for herself.SALON: You are known as a decorator of refined public institutions. "Biscuit", "Architect" ... You do and private interiors. Tell us how you get to work? Do you have any iron principles? - At one time I came to Paris to a hairdresser, a man with an international name. (She cut a bunch of celebrities, including Catherine Deneuve.) So, she asked me only three questions. The first question: who am I working for? The second question: how much time do I take myself in the morning. And third: what kind of designers clothes do I wear? Everything. And she cut amazingly, no one managed to repeat this again. And I have a few questions for people, even for those whom I know well. (Because I have not lived life with them, and maybe something intimate I do not know.) I ask about colors that a person does not like. Favorite combinations can be, can not be, maybe a person did not even think about it at all. But what a person does not like, he usually knows. Just as he knows about the unloved food. I also always ask what kind of lifestyle the masters lead. How many people are in the house during the week or during the month. Or how many people come on holiday. The structure of the house depends on it.S: And everything? “Otherwise, I make decisions myself.” For example, I can not be asked to paint the walls in a different color. Only this color suits me. And that's all. I can repaint if I do not like the most. And in general, I am always able to discuss only the finished work. I am not ready to discuss the color of this wall, if against the background of this wall there is no one light bulb that should stand, if that floor should not lie, that closet should not be that closet that should stand here, if there is no armchair on which lie that same pad. S: But what about the future tenant gets an idea of what will happen in the end? - I don't make sketches. You, having ordered something from me, cannot ask for a picture. I will not draw it.S: Do all decorators work this way? - All decorators and all architects, as a rule, draw pictures.S: Are you so special? - I'm not special, I'm just mischievous. I believe that drawing pictures is a separate discipline. From the very beginning I say: I will do it for you, but for myself. (Laughs) Therefore, I should like it. And I have it, and so it is in my head. You cannot come to me and say: we need this, this, this, that. I can show the space, and then I will say: I want this, this and that.S: Do you trust so much? - No, I just have a bunch of people with whom I have the same feeling. Here, for example, I really like some European styles. Well, not urban, but the style of Provence, Tuscany. Tuscany city - this is the palazzo. What kind of fool will the decorator refuse to make a palazzo? We do not have a palazzo, we do not physically exist. We have several buildings built in this style at the turn of the century, but there are institutions there, and people do not come to order such interiors. And when Arkady Novikov came and said: "I want a Tuscan house," I replied: "I also want a Tuscan house!" (Laughs) So there are several people whom I believe, with whom I am ready to discuss the structure of the room and the atmosphere. Is always. Because otherwise a person will have a bruise on his leg from an uncomfortable table standing. I’m at peace with this at home: I’m not always comfortable in my house, but it’s important for me that I just like it. And what will other people suffer for? For what? (Laughs) Of course, I will adapt to them. S: What do you mean when you say “do it for yourself”? - I have no task to express myself. I have a task to make the situation as close as possible to people, and at the same time so that I should not be disgusted there. That's all. And since I am a restorer in my main profession, this is exactly the first profession that helps me. (She, in fact, is the last.) The restorer, working on a painting of avant-garde painting, thinks and does within the limits of this painting, this school. When he deals with the XVIII century, the restorer also exists, and he thinks and makes decisions within the framework of this picture. He is always strictly subordinate to the situation, this is professionalism. Therefore, how different people are, how different their houses are.S: How do you start to "think" the house? - From the walls. Usually they are already there. Usually you will not get far: there is a stove from which you are dancing. And then I just get attached to some basic things. That person is going to move, and here are the things with which he is able to part, and there are things with which he is not able to part. This is a given. Then I have options: to change clothes, to re-decorate (this is with regard to furniture), repaint, ottonirovat. There are things that can be adapted to the environment. For example, I love worn items. The suit should be slightly wrinkled, and the clothes should be slightly worn. I can dance from your favorite ashtray, I do not care. Well, because any item was made by a designer, and when he did it, there was something in his head. If this is something to put in the head, looking attentively at the thing, then you can create something meaningful ... Big plastic, small plastic .... There is no big difference. I can dance on color. I have comrades, for a very long time I could not find a balance between a husband and wife, in the sense of their affections, and then I noticed an elementary thing. It takes any object, any shape ... painted in red. They thought that they had some kind of antagonism in the family, and it turned out - no, if it is red. (Laughs) Sometimes it happens that people like the picture white: white walls, white furniture, not a single picture on the walls ... I look, and where they live, there is no white color at all, complex textures of fabrics, walls hung with pictures. Well, I say, do so. "Hang something on the walls?" - "Yes of course". - "White sofas and your five children - will they (the sofas) survive?" - "Yes, the Lord is with you. What are the white sofas." And so gradually it turns out that everything that they like in the picture does not suit them at all. But if time did not begin to deal with them, they would have full confidence that they dream to move here, to what they show. In fact, it comes with practice, it’s the same as women’s - to dress. Every morning, opening a wardrobe and deciding which jacket to wear with this skirt and how to diversify it or not diversify, a woman undergoes training. She makes the choice consciously. If she also applies to things that she buys, she can make herself an interior. And she does not need any decorator. In the sense of home economics. Exactly because a good professional will probably listen to you the least. That is, he will listen at the first meeting, and if you start changing testimony in a month, these are your problems.S: And when do you need a professional? - If you want a different story. If you want an apartment or house on the verge of art, this is a completely different discipline. Then you should be led by the architect or decorator you have chosen. Take this situation. I am an artist by education, I go to the exhibition. I look at the pictures and understand how it is written. And suddenly I see a picture - and I do not understand how it is written. But she scared me like that. Do you understand, yes? A person must face such a "picture". He should be in front of the designer when he (the person) does not understand how this is done, but wants it to be so. And most of them turn to architects and decorators with the feeling that they know exactly what they want. But im
Passing the gallery 
