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Irkutsk > Decorating
wooden buildings
Decorating wooden buildings
The tradition of decorating wooden buildings goes back to the depth of centuries
and is historically associated with paganism. Our ancestors used to treat similar
decorations as magic symbols and protective amulets or visual prayers.
Modern Architecture emerged in Irkutsk in the beginning of the 20th century.
One of the examples of this style is merchant Shastin's house known to the locals
as 'the Lace House'(21 Engels Street).
Its walls, hood moulds, bargeboards and window shutters are decorated with
carpet-like ornate carvings, carved brackets, and overlay elements in the form
of exotic birds. The roof gables with their 'lacy' mouldings are reminiscent
of ancient wooden palaces from the north of Russia. Renewal of traditions in
the early 20th century laid a foundation for the nationwide Modern Architecture
movement.
Russian connoisseur G.K. Lukomsky wrote about this architectural phenomenon
back in 1916, speaking about Irkutsk one has to mention houses with details
so charming they make you wonder how such delightful plants could grow from
seeds that must have only impregnated the soil of a remote province by accident.
This type of decor was used on public-purpose and tenement buildings.
Baroque wooden architraves with hood moulds comprised of two horizontally-mirrored
spiral curls and a central element (acroterion) resembling an exotic flower
are a long-established symbol of Irkutsk's wooden architecture. Such window
architraves are traditionally decorated with high relief overlay carvings.
They became a part of the local wooden architecture in the late 18th - early
19th century. Their origin can be traced back to exuberant wood-carved iconostases
commonly found in religious architecture.
This type of facade decoration is wonderfully represented by the wooden house
at 15 Sedova Street.
Typical elements of local eaves decor are vertically-hung wood-carved bargeboards
('towels') with ornaments in shapes of leaves or sprouts and fascia boards with
floral or geometric ornaments that symbolize fertility ('cataracts of heaven').
Governor Konstantin Shelashnikov's mansion sparked numerous city legends. Although
little of this 19th-century architectural landmark is extant today, you can
still admire individual fragments of its wood-carved facade decorations. The
first draft of the mansion was produced by Irkutsk architect Alexei Razgildyaev
in 1847 following a request from special commission officer K. Daragan.
It was a log construction assembled in the round saddle-notch technique and
planked to imitate rustication. Windows in the central part of the mansion were
embellished with arch-like decorations and crowns imitating architectural stone
elements. This shows that traditions shaped by famous Irkutsk architect Alexei
Losev, author of 18th-century stone buildings, were supported by his successors.
Wood carvings became the key element of decor in buildings of the late 19th
century.
Irkutsk mayor Vladimir Sukachev's manor (112 Dekabrskhih Sobityi Street) was
built in the period from 1882 to 1888. Cultural traditions of China, Mongolia,
Japan and Central Asia had a significant influence upon the architecture of
Irkutsk. Oriental motifs are commonly found on architraves and other wood-carved
embellishments of that time period. Window architraves and hood moulds from
Sukachev's manor feature regular geometric shapes which symbolize the equilibrium
between nature and mankind and the unity of yin and yang, as well as stylized
dragons - powerful protective amulets from the Buddhist culture.
The facades of log houses and other manor buildings are abundant in fabulous
decorative elements of fantastic arabesque shapes. Their bargeboards, fasciae,
brackets and pediment infills say a lot about Irkutsk craftsmen's vivid imagination
and creativity.
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