Kolobovsky House

At the end of the 19th century the merchant of the first guild Fyodor Kolobov lived in the Ryazan province. He became a merchant not immediately. He began his career and financial career as a young man. He really wanted to become rich, so having saved money to sell small goods and borrowed some money from his mother, he bought an old barge. Together with his brother, they took it apart for firewood and sold it. And he and his brother bought a sawmill with the proceeds that were already substantial. But not in his native province, but in the rapidly growing capital St. Petersburg, on the shores of Malaya Nevka. The city grew, and with it grew the income of the brothers. And so, the dream came true, Kolobovs became millionaires and invested money in the construction of tenement houses. It was the most profitable business at the beginning of the 20th century, people were constantly arriving, profitable houses were in great demand and brought great profits to their owners. By 1917, the Kolobovs owned 40 tenement houses in Russia.

One of these houses was built in 1908-1910 by the project of the architect SG Ginger Several styles were mixed in the architecture of the house, apparently, such was the desire of its owner, the first guild merchant Fyodor Kolobov.
Find this house is not so easy if you do not know Petrogradka. It is located on the corner of Lenin and Pushkarsky Lane, not far from the Nourishing Market and the Gorkovskaya metro station. But if you find yourself in the area, then you just will not pass by. This beautiful green corner tower can be seen immediately.

Kolobovsky House has a complex plan. There are unusual triangular courtyards that overlook the triangular courtyard behind the fence. The building is decorated with columns, atlantes, there are loggias, balconies, bay windows, many different stucco details.

The front yard is located on the side of Lenin Street and is called kurdoner. Kurdoner is a front courtyard limited by the facade and wings, often found in palace ensembles. Such a front yard immediately makes clear the ambitions of the Kolobovs, with whom they conceived the construction of a building. There was a lot of money, so they did not skimp on the decoration of the facades. Anyone driving past such a house with the grandees could immediately appreciate the magnificence of the building and the amount of money invested in it. Gorgeous gates and Atlanta, looking from above the facades of the outbuildings, reinforced the effect produced.

After the revolution, the Bolsheviks took away all the property from Kolobov - a sawmill, apartment buildings, turning them into communal apartments, a huge library and settling it in the apartment of one of his own apartment buildings on Petrogradka, and then completely into a room in a communal apartment. It is not clear why he did not want to leave Russia, because he had good savings abroad. Maybe he thought it was not for long, and then he accepted it. Or maybe he loved his homeland.

The fate of the architect Ginger, too, was tragic. He was exiled to Tomsk, and then shot in 1937. And no one took into account the merits of a man who built 15 buildings only in Petersburg. Simply, he was a Jew, replacing the real name Tsalek Gershevich in the name of Sergei Ginger. This turned out to be enough to declare a man an enemy of the people.
And this beautiful, unusual profitable house still stands. It was restored and settled communal. Now it is inhabited by rich tenants. True, the courtyard was never put in order, pipes and wires hang down from the walls to the ground and it is dangerous and not pleasant to walk there. All staircases have access to the streets, maybe that's why nobody cares about the courtyards.

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