There’s music in the air….

By Anuradha K R

Photography: Courtesy the architect

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There’s no denying the fact that music possesses a magic-wand that turns our minds around. A. Len Architect Bureau has used this wand to visually transform and characterise the Lightful House “The Musician” in Vologda City, Russia, through its façade-correction project.

‘The Lightful House’, a new concept of living space, developed by Seven Suns Development, relies on the creation of attractive living environments, where each of its three projects, ‘Mi Vmeste’ (‘We’re Together’, 2013), ‘The Musician’ (2014) and ‘Tvoi Okna’ (‘Your Windows’, under construction) has a soul and spirit of its own.

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The term ‘lightful’, inherently symbolic of the light, the sun, joyfulness and warmth, also stands for ‘finding harmony’. This conceptualization presents itself as a much-needed alternative to standard, characterless ‘boxes for housing’ projects that have mushroomed across the city. ‘The Musician’ stands out with its vibrancy, amidst a monotony of faceless houses, with its project marketing concept, “The notes of his love change the world!”

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The building, a 10-storey rectangular volume with basement consists of 4 sections, with each section having a maximum of 500 sq. m. area. It’s been constructed using ‘Multi-Purpose Jointless Ossature’ technology, without girders and ‘Cube 2.5 System’ of joints. The monolithic frame is heat-insulated with 15cm heat-retainer. Ventilated façade with curtain wall-panels of different colours have been mounted above this level.

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Architect Sergey Oreshkin’s team worked on the projected building that consisted of simple multi-storey cubes, by dividing the volume into stripes and squares, creating a special rhythm. The criss-cross of volumes thus obtained were coloured on the lines of Russian Avant-Garde, famed as “The frozen music”, creating an illusion of a sophisticated façade.

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Ornamental musical notes, styled and from the real song have been used as façade-décor. Worded by M Matusovskiy and composed by B Makrousov, the song “Where’s my dark-eyed love? In Vologda, where else?”, which has acquired the status of an informal hymn of Vologda City, adorns ‘The Musician’, as a special sense of belongingness to the city takes seat in the minds of its residents.