What is remarkable about the first skyscraper in Moscow: Little-known facts about the House of Nirnzee

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Among the masterpieces of Moscow architecture, the building with the strange and difficult to pronounce name "House of Nirnzee" is rightfully considered one of the most interesting, legendary and mysterious. And to tell about all its features, perhaps, a whole book will not be enough. Here are just some interesting facts about this house.

Who is Nirnsee

Before the construction of the famous house in Bolshoy Gnezdnikovsky Lane, this address was the location of a noble estate, which included both stone and wooden buildings. In 1873, its next owners, the Kaisarovs, adapted the buildings for rooms for rent, and in May 1912, when the landowner Bystrova already owned the site, she sold it for building to a German architect who settled in Russia - Ernst-Richard Nirnzee. A civil engineer by training, he tried himself in different styles (eclecticism, modernism, neoclassicism, etc.). The architect was popular with customers - in total, he built about forty apartment buildings in the center of Moscow.

However, the house in Bolshoy Gnezdnikovsky turned out to be more noticeable than all his other works. Nirnzee decided to build a building that would be higher in height than all other houses in Moscow and at the same time would have compact and highly functional apartments for single tenants and young families. The house is even considered to be the prototype of Soviet communal houses.

The city government issued a permit for the construction of a nine-storey building with central water heating, the architect promptly developed and submitted a project to the authorities, and in the summer of 1913, the house with a height of more than 40 meters was almost ready. The architect himself later settled here.

Famous tenants

It is known that in this house there was a historical acquaintance of Mikhail Bulgakov with his future wife Elena Shilovskaya, who later became the prototype of the beloved Master - Margarita. It was from the roof of the House of Nirnzee that Bulgakov surveyed the capital in his work "Forty forties". In addition, Vladimir Mayakovsky lived in this building.

Also, the legend says that this house was visited by Grigory Rasputin, moreover, under mystical circumstances. Allegedly, soon after the construction, residents began to hear strange voices in the premises, in addition, suicides were often thrown from the roof of the "skyscraper" - in the same way, one of the sons of the architect Nirnzee committed suicide. The people began to talk about the presence of evil spirits in the house, and the famous healer and mystic Grigory Rasputin was invited here to drive it out (at that time the house was no longer owned by Nirnzee, but by Dmitry Rubinstein). According to legend, after some manipulations carried out by Rasputin, strange things in the house no longer happened.

For some time in the basement of the house there was a cabaret "The Bat", famous actors of the Moscow Art Theater lived here.

And after the revolution, in the 1930s, the famous state prosecutor of Moscow trials, Andrei Vyshinsky, lived here. A powerful neighbor instilled fear in all tenants, however, and after the sensational processes he himself did not feel safe - he had personal security in the house and even used a separate elevator.

The tallest and most modern

Until 1931, the Nirnsee House was the tallest building in the capital. Valentin Kataev noted that this house served as the vertical dominant of the entire Tverskoy district, and compared it with an American skyscraper.

The observation deck on the roof attracted curious people from all over Moscow, in addition, a miniature theater and, of course, a restaurant were located on the roof. And in the first years after the revolution, movies were shown here. By the way, the observation deck was even paid at one time - the entrance cost 20 kopecks.

After the revolution

At the beginning of 1918, the House of Nirnsee was nationalized, and its architect and former owner, according to one version, left for America, and according to another, he died, throwing himself into a flight of stairs of this very building.

In the 1930s, more spectacular-looking Stalin-era skyscrapers appeared in Moscow, and against their background the house began to seem old-fashioned and not so majestic, despite the fact that it was very interesting from an architectural point of view.

After the revolution, the house, on the one hand, remained the same bourgeois "tucherez" (as the townspeople called it by analogy with the word "skyscraper") with sculptures on the facade and vases. On the other hand, the contingent has changed. Old tenants, either on their own or on someone else's will, left their apartments. Among the new inhabitants of the house, employees of the state security bodies and party workers began to prevail. By the way, in the 1930s, there was an endless stream of repression in this house.

During the war

Interestingly, during the Great Patriotic War, such a tall building almost did not suffer from air raids, including due to the fact that an air defense battery was located on its roof. According to the recollections of old-timers, when Soviet troops began to liberate our cities from the enemy one by one, in honor of each such event, fireworks were fired from the roof of the house, accompanied by the light of searchlights. At such moments, the residents, of course, were not allowed upstairs by the military - you could watch the fireworks from the lower roof of the building.

In May 1945, the Victory Salute from the roof of the House of Nirnsee counted three dozen volleys from a thousand guns.

The roof is like a courtyard

After the war, life in the house remained just as unique - its inhabitants had their own world. For example, instead of the standard Moscow courtyard, there is a roof. Children here did their homework, rode bicycles, and played ball (although if it flew off the roof, they had to run down the stairs in search of it). Here lilacs grew, there were tubs of flowers, and there was wicker furniture for relaxation. The roof was also used as a beach - on sunny summer days it was possible to sunbathe here.

There were also three kindergartens in the Nirnzee house, and one of them was private despite the Soviet years (the cultural elite took their children to it).

The film "Office Romance" was filmed here

It was on the roof of this legendary house that a frank conversation took place between the characters of the "Office Romance" - Novoseltsev and his "boss, mymry" Kalugina. This moment of the film is one of the key ones, so it was very important that the scene took place in a visually memorable, iconic place, although, according to the plot, it was an ordinary roof on which the stern boss left her office to cry alone.

During the conversation of the main characters in the background, in addition to the panorama of Moscow, you can perfectly see the characteristic fence of the roof of the Nirnzee House.

Read on to continue the topic: A home for the elite: Rumors and facts about the legendary Stalinist skyscraper - a house on Kotelnicheskaya.