The former administrative building of Kazpotrebsoyuz (

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

: Здание Казпотребсоюза, '' tr. zdanie kazpotrebsoyuza'') is a building in

Almaty Almaty (; kk, Алматы; ), formerly known as Alma-Ata ( kk, Алма-Ата), is the List of most populous cities in Kazakhstan, largest city in Kazakhstan, with a population of about 2 million. It was the capital of Kazakhstan from 1929 to ...

, which housed the central office of Kazpotrebsoyuz. Currently, it is an administrative building with offices located on the first floor.

History

Construction of the building was carried out during 1953-1957, the authors of the project were: architects B.N. Stesin, G. Bobovich, M. Bekker; the engineer was V. Lukhtanov. It is an example of the architecture of administrative buildings in

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country located mainly in Central Asia and partly in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the north and west, China to the east, Kyrgyzstan to the southeast, Uzbeki ...

of the 1950s and a monument of architecture. In the 1990s, after the closure of Kazpotrebsoyuz, the building was empty for some time. Currently, it is a residential building with offices located on the first floor.

Architecture

The building is shaped in the form of cyrillic letter “ Г”, symmetrical three-story body on a low plinth consists of three pavilions, separated by anti-seismic joints. The main facade faces Government Square. In the three-story building, the corner is highlighted by a six-story tower with a tall

spire A spire is a tall, slender, pointed structure on top of a roof of a building or tower, especially at the summit of church steeples. A spire may have a square, circular, or polygonal plan, with a roughly conical or pyramidal shape. Spires are ...

. The form of the tower is borrowed from the Central Asian architectural tradition and is sunken in relation to both facades of the building. The tapering upward is done by ledges, the edges of which are framed with a profiled

cornice In architecture, a cornice (from the Italian ''cornice'' meaning "ledge") is generally any horizontal decorative moulding that crowns a building or furniture element—for example, the cornice over a door or window, around the top edge of a ...

and

baluster A baluster is an upright support, often a vertical moulded shaft, square, or lathe-turned form found in stairways, parapets, and other architectural features. In furniture construction it is known as a spindle. Common materials used in its cons ...

s. The cornice above the fourth floor is completed with

stalactites A stalactite (, ; from the Greek 'stalaktos' ('dripping') via ''stalassein'' ('to drip') is a mineral formation that hangs from the ceiling of caves, hot springs, or man-made structures such as bridges and mines. Any material that is soluble an ...

. The windows and doors of the first floor of the tower, as well as of the whole building, have a lancet shape and a rectangular frame with ornamental fillings. The windowsills of the second floor are united by a belt. The windows on the three floors of the second floor have a common rectangular casing. Above the lancet window on the fourth floor there is a patterned filling. Between the windows of the second, third and fourth floors there are panels. The second tier ends with a developed complex profiled cornice with an arcature band and shaped brackets. The fence of the area on the roof of the tier is an arcade on columns between the bollards. The one-story third tier is an octagon with narrow corner blades, an ornamented frieze and a three-part cornice. The lancet windows have a simple platband. Under the two-part window sill there are shaped brackets. On the blank wall between the

pilaster In classical architecture Classical architecture usually denotes architecture which is more or less consciously derived from the principles of Greek and Roman architecture of classical antiquity, or sometimes even more specifically, from the ...

s in the corner of the building (at the corner of ) is a

cartouche In Egyptian hieroglyphs, a cartouche is an oval with a line at one end tangent to it, indicating that the text enclosed is a royal name. The first examples of the cartouche are associated with pharaohs at the end of the Third Dynasty, but the fea ...

with the date of construction - 1957. Its structure includes a small cornice. The fence of the roof is made in the form of a figured lattice between the bollards. Above the converged windows in the corner of the building between the bollards of the roof railing is placed a shield with

volute A volute is a spiral, scroll-like ornament that forms the basis of the Ionic order, found in the capital of the Ionic column. It was later incorporated into Corinthian order and Composite column capitals. Four are normally to be found on an Ion ...

Monument status

On 10 November 2010, a new State List of Historical and Cultural Monuments of Local Significance in Almaty was approved, simultaneously with which all previous decisions on this subject were declared invalid. In this decree, the status of the former Kazpotrebsoyuz administrative building as a monument of local importance was preserved. The boundaries of the protection zones were approved in 2014.

References

{{coord missing, Kazakhstan Office buildings in Almaty 1955 establishments in the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic Office buildings completed in 1955 Neoclassical architecture