The 2021 Architectural Seasons at SPbGASU Are Over
The 11th International Creative Forum ‘Architectural Seasons at SPbGASU’ has come to an end. From April 20 to 30, the Faculty of Architecture hosted a series of events aimed at enhancing the students’ creative potential.
The annual Master's Degree Show took place for the 6th time this year, having become a part of the educational process for the faculty’s degree-awarding departments. During the event, graduate students present their theses, and undergraduates of the fourth or fifth year of study act as opponents – asking questions, making comments and suggestions concerning the project and the research part of the graduate paper. Through this dialogue, Master’s students improve their presentation skills and gain impetus for further development, while Bachelor’s students get an idea of defending a thesis for a Master’s degree.
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This year, the Master's degree show consisted of two stages. From April 21 to 23, it was held in a traditional format separately at each Department, and on April 30, the second part of the conference took place online: graduates from SPbGASU and the Polytechnic University of Milan presented their projects developed for the city of St. Petersburg and Kronstadt. Representatives of the Italian university told that their students had planned to come to Russia during the previous year to visit the project locations and collect all the necessary materials. However, the pandemic changed their plans, and the Master's programme supervisors had to look for other ways to work on the qualifying projects resorting to online maps and archival materials.
“Such events demonstrate different architectural schools’ approaches to design. For Italian architects, the main thing is not to harm the existing cultural and historical environment. The key part in their work is the pre-project analysis, study of the area for design. The goal of our student projects is to reorganize depressed areas, create an architectural environment that is comfortable for living and attractive for tourism. At the same time, it is necessary to preserve the spirit of the historic city,” said Yulia Devyatova, Associate Professor of the Department of Architectural Design at SPbGASU.
The Italian colleagues acknowledged that projects of SPbGASU students were more interesting and expressive. Dean of the SPbGASU Faculty of Architecture Fedor Perov proposed the next step for cooperation: graduate projects of both Russian and Italian students can be prepared on the basis of Milan venues and facilities.
From April 21 to 29, the Student Council of the Faculty of Architecture organized a competition and exhibition of the best course projects in the main university building. Voting took place both online (for students) and in person (for teachers).
Architecture students of all years of study participated in the competition on a voluntary basis and had the right to submit one of their works. The voting took place in several stages and the following winners have been determined:
1st place among first-year student projects: Yulia Gevlich
1st place among second-year student projects: Marina Antusheva
1st place among third-year student projects: Nil Nasedkin
1st place among fourth-year student projects: Anna Maleva
1st place among fifth-year student projects + award for ‘Best Public Building’: Kamila Gilmutdinova
‘Best Improvement’ category: Ksenia Goncharova
‘Best Graphics’: Yulia Gevlich
‘Best Residential Building’: Olga Semyonova
‘Best Interior’: Maria Khmelnitskaya
Fedor Perov
✔ In the previous years, the winning students had travelled to Florence for an architecture festival, where they participated in a variety of events, including master classes by the world's leading architects. The festival was cancelled in 2020, but this year the event will hopefully take place again.
“Architecture is a competitive thing. Therefore, the skills of competitive presentation are very important. Those who have exhibited their works are not indifferent, they are interested in finding out their rating, to understand their level of training,” believes Fedor Perov.
One of significant events within the framework of the Architectural Seasons was the lecture given by Mikhail Sarri, Honoured Architect of Russia, Head of Architectural Workshop No. 6 of JSC LenNIIproekt, a graduate of SPbGASU. His lecture, which took place on April 28, was attended by undergraduates and graduate students, teachers of the Faculty of Architecture, and other St. Petersburg architects.
“Despite his busy professional schedule, Mikhail Sarri did not break off the connection with our university. He is a member of the State Attestation Commission and annually attends the defense of diploma projects at the Faculty of Architecture, speaks at conferences and communicates with students, igniting their interest and love for the profession,” told Yulia Devyatova.
The audience learned about ways of interaction with the customer, the decision-making process in the design of a large residential complex, and how the environment (streets, houses, green spaces and parks) affects the layout of the complex. After the lecture, Mikhail Sarri invited everyone to join an excursion to the residential complex "Primorsky Quarter" under construction on Kolomyazhsky Prospekt, being built by ‘Megalit’ company jointly with ‘Okhta Group’. Its concept was developed by Architectural workshop No. 6 of JSC LenNIIproekt under the leadership of M. Sarri. About 60 participants joined the site tour, mostly third-year students of the Department of Architectural Design. During the excursion, they examined the residential buildings, a kindergarten for 430 places with a swimming pool, a playground, an underground parking lot with special elevators and parking spaces for people with limited mobility. The visitors received the opportunity to see the details of the utilities, roof and roof parapet.
The university plans to organize such events (lectures by leading architects with visits to construction sites) on an ongoing basis. This stimulates future architects’ creativity and helps introducing them to the professional community.
Text: Tatyana Petrova
Photos: Sergey Klishis
✔ Find more information about the Department of Architectural Design
