Oleg Shapiro: ‘The project is 110% complete, it became more complicated in the process’

Much was out of reach

“Exactly one week later, a special operation took place and much changed. It turned out that much of what we were counting on was out of our reach,” Oleg Shapiro described the situation the team faced after the consortium led by Wowhaus won the competition for the concept of the new Kamal Theatre. “And then we learned that everything is available. It turns out that our country is bigger than we thought, and does things better and better than we thought.”

Of course, many foreign building materials were brought in before the new round of sanctions. But, in particular, Shapiro pointed out, the roof for the theatre was made in Novosibirsk. The main part of the speeches at the session was devoted to glass structures.

The new building is partly an illusion of the “old house” of the theatre, the architect noted, recalling that it was previously called a “chisel”: “By the way, this is good late Soviet modernism!”

“It is an impenetrable, concrete theatre, protecting from everything, a sacred space where everything is inaccessible until the performance is ready. And there is a new theatre, which is fundamentally transparent.”

That is why the new building has a lot of glass. In particular, giant windows that reflect infrared light in winter and prevent the building from overheating in summer.

“In any case, we believe in all this. Well, if anything, there are curtains,” joked Shapiro.

The glass also reflects the sky and water, thus harmoniously fitting the object into the landscape from the Lake Kaban side. And at night, thanks to the lighting, the “ice floes” turn into “butterfly wings.”

“The ideology is that we have a cold facade and a very warm, hot interior space. Here is creativity, here is the hearth, here is the home. In the evening, the interior shines through the rather cold facades,” noted Shapiro.

The issue of accessibility of the new theatre building for the general public is still being discussed. It is assumed that only people who have purchased excursions will be able to study it in detail. But it is unlikely that they will be able to walk through it, judging by the latest information.

Glass, enlightened and oversized

Larta Glass brand appeared in the same 2022, when the main shareholder and President of FSK company Vladimir Voronin bought out the Guardian Glass enterprises. Now there are three factories — in Ryazan, Ramenskoye and Rostov region.

As Zukhra Gayazova explained, the Kamal Theatre became one of the first buildings in Russia where two new technologies for the country were used. Firstly, this is enlightened glass with a maximum light transmittance coefficient. Also, here they used glass not of the usual format, but oversized — more than seven meters long. Previously, such glass was made only in Europe and China.

Each fragment was made according to drawings and tempered. This is multilayer glass with the use of a special film — triplex. If it accidentally breaks, the fragments will remain in the film.

“The glass will hang, just cracked. Quite beautiful, by the way,” added Shapiro and recalled that earlier his architects could afford glass four meters high, they made it in Dubna.

Gayazova added that the glass should ensure the energy efficiency of the building, so that the maintenance costs do not differ much from the costs of the previous theatre.

When the parking will appear

“Sometimes it seemed that we would not have time, that we could simplify the solution. But we can’t do that, some kind of divine hand helped us,” Gayazova pointed out.

“This feeling was there for the whole year and a half,” agreed Shapiro, that there was little time, but Shamil Gafarov led the process, and it seems to me that this is such a divine hand that made everyone afraid, but do it. It must be said that no matter how quickly it was done, this project has not been simplified in any way compared to the competition project. I would say that the project is 110% complete, it has become more complicated in the process.

Realnoe Vremya wondered what happened to the parking project that can be seen in the competition concept? And how does the theater fit into the urban ensemble against the backdrop of Khrushchev-era buildings on of Khadi Taktash Street?

“When we lower such a heavy object as a theatre, such a planet, onto the city, it deforms its gravitational field,” Shapiro reasoned. “The city influences it, influences the city. If you noticed, here, thank God, they demolished the gas station. The embankment continued to develop here, and a park appeared here in place of the garages.” As the architect explained, the situation with parking in the theatre was complicated.

“Because there are regulations. And at the entrance, where the park is now, the concept included a surface parking lot. There was enough of it. But in the process, when we drew it together with the city, we felt sorry for the place. Now there is a festival site here. We removed all the cars from there and technologically shoved a very small number of cars inside. But it is assumed that at some point there will be a multi-story parking lot here. This is on the one hand. And on the other hand, you know, there is no parking near the La Scala theatre, and it has been visited for many centuries. But there is public transport nearby. It seems to me that this project is more environmentally friendly.

“This house changes the landscape, — Shapiro continued. — Khrushchev-era buildings are not bad in principle, as an abstract structure. But, of course, they are outdated, they are not exactly dilapidated, but something needs to be done with them. There are two options. In Moscow, they are torn down and houses twice as high are built. This is a question for developers. And in Germany, they are simply renovated and made into good houses.”

The audience also wondered how the problem of glass contamination would be solved, since there is a lot of dust in Kazan. After explaining the production technology a little more, Shapiro replied that it is subject to regular cleaning: “Of course, it needs to be washed.”