SPEECH

SPEECH Tchoban & Kuznetsov is an inter­na­tion­al­ly active archi­tec­ture firm based in Moscow that sets archi­tec­tur­al trends. The two part­ners — Sergei Tchoban, a Ger­man born in St. Peters­burg, and Sergey Kuznetsov, a Mus­covite — are deeply root­ed in the archi­tec­tur­al world of both West­ern and East­ern Europe. Their work rep­re­sents the cul­tur­al exchange of archi­tec­tur­al val­ues​between these two regions.

In Rus­sia, West­ern stan­dards such as func­tion­al design, thought­ful plan­ning, and high-qual­i­ty crafts­man­ship and tech­ni­cal con­struc­tion are in high demand. Con­verse­ly, the archi­tects see a need for improve­ment in West­ern Europe regard­ing emo­tion­al expres­sive­ness, artis­tic design, and a love of dec­o­ra­tion — qual­i­ties that are more deeply root­ed in the Russ­ian archi­tec­tur­al tradition.

Through their bilin­gual archi­tec­ture mag­a­zine ​“speech,” exhi­bi­tions, and their design for the Berlin Muse­um of Archi­tec­tur­al Draw­ing, they express their vision of archi­tec­tur­al cul­ture and qual­i­ty. Their phi­los­o­phy is also reflect­ed in numer­ous build­ing projects and urban plan­ning ini­tia­tives in Russia.

This book illu­mi­nates the basic ideas, val­ues​and themes of the SPEECH project and illus­trates them using com­plet­ed build­ings by the office in Moscow.