As the population increases, people in big cities strive to build as many residential buildings as possible. Buildings built on former cemeteries have long been common. Although it is better to abandon the idea of ​​such construction, because both the builders and the residents of such buildings may be in danger.

Why shouldn't you build a house on the site of a cemetery?

Modern populated areas are growing rapidly. The number of people increases every year, and each person needs their own home. Abandoned burial sites, the territory of which has been empty for quite a long time, can become a place for the construction of residential buildings.

Many people don’t even think about why it is impossible to build a house on the site of a cemetery, and what danger it carries.

The graveyard is the resting place for the dead. These people were once someone's relatives and loved ones. Each of them had their own destiny. To erect any building, especially a residential building, on human bones is, at the very least, unethical.

Even if you are far from mysticism and magic, and do not think that your actions can disturb the spirit of deceased people, it is still better to honor their memory and not start construction on the site where human ashes rest. After all, such actions can be characterized as vandalism and complete disrespect.

If construction does take place, then people who are “lucky” to live in such a house will be regularly exposed to the influence of negative energy. There is such a thing as , By visiting the churchyard, each of us can feel its influence on ourselves. Some people feel peace when they come here, others experience anxiety, and some experience horror and panic. But no matter what people feel, few would want to live in this place.

In addition, many of you have probably heard about. Even after visiting the graveyard, our ancestors carefully washed their shoes before entering their house, for fear of bringing soil, which is a powerful artifact, into their home. It is used in many black magic rituals. Throwing soil from a churchyard onto a threshold or windowsill can damage you through illness, bad luck, or even death.

Therefore, a building built on the site of a cemetery can bring happiness to few people. People living in such houses complain of systematic headaches, weakness, loss of strength, they often have bad dreams, and even see the ghosts of the deceased, whose peace was disturbed. Such residents get sick more often, they often experience nervous disorders, and some even lose their minds, ending their days in a psychiatric hospital.

What is it like to live in a house built on a cemetery?

Any person with psychic abilities, upon arriving in such a house, immediately feels the energy of the other world. Sooner or later, the disturbed souls of those buried in the cemetery, on the site of which the foundation of this building was laid, will influence the inhabitants.

This influence can manifest itself in different ways. But in most cases, it does not threaten anything good for the residents. Their life can change dramatically for the worse.

People living in a house in a cemetery begin to get sick, some have worsening chronic diseases, others may develop oncology. Mental illness is also not uncommon. Animals do not take root well in such houses; they behave strangely and restlessly.

According to statistics, many residents of such houses become alcoholics and drug addicts. The percentage of suicides among “cemetery” residents is also high.

During construction, troubles often happen - workers are injured, and sometimes even die under unknown circumstances.

It’s unfortunate, but it’s practically impossible to cleanse a house built on the site of an old cemetery from negative energy.

Ghosts in abandoned cemeteries

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It is traditionally believed that churches and temples have been built in places with positive energy since ancient times. But is this really so? After all, temples were often built on the site of former pagan temples, where sacrifices were made, and others were even built “on blood,” that is, where people died.

And there were often burial places near the temples. Many buildings Russian capital built on the site of former church cemeteries - they were demolished during the expansion and renovation of the city.

Meanwhile, by decree of 1657, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich prohibited burials in the Kremlin and Kitai-Gorod. In 1723, Peter I commanded: “In Moscow and other cities, dead human bodies, except for noble persons, should not be buried inside cities.”

However, after the death of the emperor, until 1771, the dead were buried within the city and only then stopped. The Soviet government destroyed more than four hundred church graveyards in the capital, along with churches, but built a cemetery right in the Kremlin wall. And the Mausoleum on Red Square still stands...

Occultists have a hypothesis that revolutionaries deliberately built buildings “on blood” - on the sites of graveyards and massacres. Moreover, they built not just houses, but government institutions - courts, people's commissariats. Allegedly, it is easier to confuse people’s brains and hammer crazy ideas into their heads in buildings where a person’s consciousness becomes clouded and he begins to perceive reality distorted.

But there was nothing new in this; methods that had long been used by clergy were simply transferred to the new reality...

One way or another, the building that now houses the State Duma was built on the site of the Paraskeva Pyatnitsa Church in Okhotny Ryad. Near the wooden church in the 15th century there was a field where “judicial duels” took place.

There was a judicial practice in which the outcome of the dispute between the plaintiff and the defendant was decided in a fair fight - it was believed that this was “God’s court” and only the one who was truly right could win. Many were killed in these fights, and the ground here was literally saturated with blood. Later, a stone one was erected on the site of the wooden structure, and a parish cemetery was built behind the church.

It is interesting that the signs and functions of the main female deity of the Slavic pantheon, Mokoshi, were transferred to the cult of the Christian saint Paraskeva Pyatnitsa. Her image is associated with spinning, weaving and crafts. But the main thing is that Mokosh performed the work that the Moirai did among the Greeks, the parks among the Romans, and the Norns among the Vikings: she spun the thread of fate.

By the way, there were two Paraskeva Pyatnitsa churches in Moscow. Pyatnitskaya Street has preserved the memory of the female deity who was worshiped here since ancient times. Here, in the place where the lobby of the Novokuznetskaya metro station is now, stood another Paraskeva Pyatnitsa church, which had the status of “farewell”.

And according to ethnographic evidence, places of worship of Mokoshi were called “farewells”. It was here that her sanctuary was located in pre-Christian times. Both Paraskeva churches - sacred places where the invisible threads of fate are woven - were located opposite each other on both sides of the Moscow River.

In 1928, the church in Okhotny Ryad was demolished, and by 1935, the House of the USSR Labor and Defense Council was erected in its place. Later it housed the Council of People's Commissars and the State Planning Committee. It was here that projects like turning Siberian rivers to the south were often born. And it is not surprising that the current State Duma, where the fate of the state is decided, was traditionally located here too...

On July 11, 2002, Komsomolskaya Pravda published an article “The Supreme Court of Russia stands on bones.” It said: “In Moscow, under the floor of the Supreme Court building on Povarskaya Street, construction workers discovered human remains.

The main version of the burial is that a long time ago there was a cemetery at the church. And in 1938 the temple was destroyed. In 1954, the Supreme Court building was built on this site. According to another version, the burial may date back to the 1930-1940 years of mass repression.”

Another Moscow landmark with bones is the building of the old Manege. It was built in 1817 by order of Emperor Alexander I. The construction of the building in the very center of the capital, near the Kremlin, was timed to coincide with the fifth anniversary of Russia's victory over Napoleon, intending it to host military exercises and parades.

Once upon a time, as the chronicles say, on the site of Manezhnaya Square there was a Stremyannaya Settlement of the Streltsy Regiment. In 1493 it burned to the ground. After the fire, it was forbidden to erect any buildings at that place: they were afraid that if it caught fire again, the fire would spread to the Kremlin.

In 1993, archaeological excavations began on Manezhnaya Square. Researchers recovered from the ground numerous household items, ancient coins, and jewelry. We also came across layers of pure sand and coal. These were the remains of a long-ago fire in Stremyannaya Sloboda.

Human remains lay at a depth of 6-7 m. Scientists have counted more than forty graves dating back to the period before the Mongol invasion of Rus' in 1237. Most likely, the graveyard was located at an Orthodox church.

The warriors of Khan Batu burned the temple and destroyed the cemetery, and centuries later a Streltsy settlement was erected on this site. Perhaps people simply forgot what was here before, and this became the cause of a chain of further dramatic events.

On Sunday, March 14, 2004, the next presidential election was held in Russia. At 21:14 a fire started in the attic of the Manege. The fire area was more than 2000 m2. By midnight, only a charred skeleton remained of the monument of Russian architecture: the roof and end walls of the Manege were destroyed.

Muscovites are well aware of the gloomy-looking gray building in Moscow on Serafimovich Street, known as the House on the Embankment. Its sad fame is associated primarily with the political repressions of the Stalin era.

The place where the house stands was once called the Swamp - because of the lake located here, overgrown with mud and duckweed. In the 16th century, boyar Bersenya Beklemishev (the embankment was named Bersenevskaya after him) began building his chambers here. Not completed, he was executed by order of Tsar Vasily III.

The construction was completed by Duma clerk Averky Kirillov, but even he did not have the chance to live in the new place: he died during the Streltsy riot. Around the same years, state criminals were executed in the Swamp. The legendary robber Vanka Cain robbed merchants passing here. In addition, there were fist fights very nearby. The churchyard of the Church of St. Nicholas on Berseny was also located here. In a word, the place is disastrous, unsuitable for life.

However, it was in the area of ​​Bersenevskaya embankment, on Vsekhsvyatskaya street, on the right bank of the Moscow River, on the site of the former Wine and Salt Yard, that in the late 1920s they decided to build a “house of the future” for the party elite.
Officially, it was then called the home of senior officials of the Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR. Before construction began, all the old buildings were demolished. The foundation was placed directly on the tombstones of the old church cemetery.

The house was commissioned in the early 1930s. There have always been many legends about him. They said that between the walls of the apartments there were secret corridors, into which Lubyanka employees entered every evening to listen to what the residents were talking about.

Every now and then someone was arrested, but the neighbors did not see anything, since state security agents entered the stairwells not through the entrances, but through hidden passages in the garbage chute system. Those arrested were taken down the elevator to the basement, to the third floor minus, where the trolley was already waiting. From there they were taken through an underground tunnel directly to the Lubyanka.

Among the remaining residents, many committed suicide. Perhaps the general atmosphere of fear was taking its toll: the person was afraid that since his neighbor was arrested today, they would certainly arrest him tomorrow. Or maybe the negative cemetery energy of the area where the ominous building stands is to blame.

Building a house even on a free plot is not the easiest thing. It’s even more difficult if there are buildings on the land plot that you no longer need, and in their place you want to build a new cottage or townhouse. Today we will figure out how to build a house on a plot that is still occupied by another building.

Building a house even on a free plot is not the easiest thing. It’s even more difficult if there are buildings on the land plot that you no longer need, and in their place you want to build a new cottage or townhouse. Today we will figure out how to build a house on a plot that is still occupied by another building.

The situation described above is far from hypothetical; a very specific example can be given. A family with three children inherited a plot of land with a house built around 1979. It would seem that this is freedom, you can do whatever you want. But, upon reflection, the couple came to the conclusion that everything is not so simple. First, what to do with an old house? It is, of course, theoretically possible to live in it: there is stove heating and electricity. But I want it better! So that there is gas, running water, a civilized heating system for the premises. And the house should be two-story, so that each family member has his own room.

The old house by no means fit into the image of an ideal family nest. Therefore, the new owners decided, it must be demolished. And put a new one in the vacant place. New questions immediately arose: demolish it completely or leave the foundation? Do I need to obtain a demolition permit? Is the old foundation suitable for a two-story new house? How then to coordinate the new construction with the BTI? We asked real estate market experts about all this.

Down to the ground and then

First of all, you need to think about what problems might arise if you leave the old foundation and build a new building on it. Yulia Severinenko, general director of the ZemAktiv company, believes that it is necessary to first conduct an inspection of the old foundation. This is done by specialists who will evaluate the technical condition of the existing foundation, the properties of the soil at its base, and the suitability of the structure for future loads. As a rule, if it is, for example, a monolithic reinforced concrete foundation, which was made correctly at one time, it will be possible to erect a new structure on it from any material.

True, if the foundation was poured back in Soviet times, then it is unlikely to be in decent condition. “In 1979, no one made foundations using modern technologies. High-grade concrete was in short supply, and few people followed the technology in low-rise construction. Based on the foundation, which has been standing for 30 years, you can almost immediately tell whether it will stand for another 100 years, or whether it has already practically “died,” says Alexander Dubovenko, development director of GOOD WOOD.

Therefore, the owner of an old house needs to decide whether to spend money on an examination of the condition of the foundation.

In addition, in any case, you need to check the documents for the land, even if you are going to build a house on the site of the old one, without changing the development plan, because, as practice shows, land plots and houses acquired or built before the 90s were often not registered. “From a legal point of view, it is possible to build a new house on an old foundation if the land is owned and the permitted use of the land includes the construction of a house,” explains Alexander Sergeev, legal adviser to the Volzhskie Dachi Management Company.

However, if the object was transferred by inheritance or as a gift, then problems with registration of ownership, and therefore with the disposal of this property should not arise.

Demolition or reconstruction?

Experts note that obtaining a demolition permit depends on many factors, in particular, on the nature of the supplied communications and the requirements of utility services when reconnecting them. “Therefore, in order to simplify approvals, owners often demolish a house and build a new one under the guise of reconstructing the property, or use similar schemes,” says Yulia Severinenko.

Irina Bashilova, head of the legal department of the Volzhskie Dachi Management Company, believes that it is quite possible to register the construction of a new house on an old foundation as a “major repair” or “reconstruction” of the previous house, but you need to be very careful about the process. “The substitution of concepts will be advisable only if we are talking about “major repairs” or “reconstruction” that do not affect the structural and other characteristics of the reliability and safety of a capital construction project and (or) its parts and do not exceed the maximum parameters of permitted construction, reconstruction established by urban planning regulations. Only in this case, in accordance with Art. 51 of the Town Planning Code of the Russian Federation, there will be no need to first obtain a construction permit, and after the construction of a residential building, a permit to put the facility into operation,” the expert warns.

Therefore, it seems that it is better to completely demolish the old house along with the foundation in order to build a new cottage on the vacant plot. By the way, the majority of Sobstvennik readers think the same thing: according to the results of our survey, 36% of respondents would prefer this option.

Demolish, cannot be pardoned!

Now let's see what needs to be done to properly formalize the demolition of the structure. Alexander Sergeev emphasizes that the owner of the house has every right to dispose of his property, including destroying it, and if the house is registered in the cadastral register, then it will need to be removed from this register.

But first, you need to carry out the actual demolition, and then contact the BTI authorities to draw up a house inspection report. “Based on the inspection report, the BTI will cancel the record of the existence of the house. After this, you need to contact the Rosreestr department with an application to make a record of the cessation of the existence of the old house,” explains Maria Bondarevskaya, a lawyer at the law firm Yukov, Khrenov and Partners.

As for the technical features of demolition, it is necessary to demolish the house itself, as well as the basement part of the foundation to ground level, since dismantling the underground part will be very expensive. “For example, you will have to drill out piles laid several meters deep, or tear up a foundation pit in order to remove concrete that was once poured,” says Yulia Severinenko.

In these cases, the expert believes, it is better to shift the new foundation slightly so that it does not coincide with the old one. If it is important that the new house stands on the same wall-to-wall construction site, the underground part will also have to be dismantled. But it's extremely expensive.

After demolition, the site will need to be prepared for new construction. “It is necessary to remove construction waste, plan the territory of a new construction site, equip an entrance to the site (for construction equipment), install temporary structures (cabins) for storing materials, tools, accommodation for builders, carry out engineering preparation (providing the site with electricity, water, sanitary cabins)” , - advises Dmitry Yazykov, construction director of the Zagorodny Project company.

Behind the front facade of building 44 on Independence Avenue begins the Golden Hill. Once the outskirts of the city, where they built a house for the elite, quietly destroying an ancient cemetery, and then eliminated “enemies of the people”, evicting entire entrances. Towers rose here, sending noise to the receivers of Minsk residents who decided to sip "Freedom" and listen to the "voices", and even a major terrorist attack was being prepared. The Village Belarus found out whether the residents of the house, which has become a symbol not only of evening Minsk, sleep peacefully.

Text and photos

ELENA SELKINA

ARCHITECT: Mikhail Barshch

LOCATION: Independence Avenue, 44

CONSTRUCTION: 1953–1955

SQUARE: 16,543 sq. m.

NUMBER OF APARTMENTS: 182

NUMBER OF FLOORS: from 5 to 7

SALE:$95,000 for a 2-bedroom, $160,000 for a 3-bedroom, $185,000 for a 4-bedroom

RENT PER MONTH: from 550 dollars for a two-room apartment

RENTAL PER DAY: 60–120 rubles for a two-room apartment

Quarter instead of the old cemetery

The intersection of Independence Avenue and Kozlov Street is today in the very center. But back at the beginning of the last century, this was the outskirts of the city - Zolotaya Gorka, where wooden houses very rarely stood along Zakharyevskaya Street, and an ancient churchyard began on a hill near the road.

People have been buried here since the 16th century. At one time the cemetery was Uniate, but later it became Catholic. When in 1832 a fire destroyed the church on Trinity Hill (now Trinity Suburb), a small wooden chapel on Zolotaya Gorka became the center of the first Catholic parish in Minsk, founded in the 14th century by King Jagiello.

There are several versions of why the hill is called Golden Hill. One indicates that the Old Market was nearby. The other was for inns that brought good income. Local robbers could have hidden loot on the hill among the graves. And, of course, the cemetery trees turned golden in the fall.

There is a beautiful legend about a pile of gold that the residents of Minsk collected for the construction of the Church of St. Roja. So the townspeople of different denominations of the saint for deliverance from the terrible cholera epidemic. The cholera cemetery began immediately behind the Catholic one, where the houses are now at the intersection of Zolotaya Gorka and Krasnozvezdnaya streets.

In 1864, the new Church of St. Rocha, in neo-Gothic style, was consecrated and has stood for a century and a half. For most of its history it was misused. Already in the 1930s, the temple was finally closed, and the revered statue of St. Roch disappeared from it. The gradual destruction of the cemetery began - construction along Sovetskaya Street reached these places.

The main destruction awaited in the post-war years - a new Stalin Avenue and nearby neighborhoods were created. Houses along Kozlova Street up to the intersection with Zolotaya Gorka Street and along it to Krasnozvezdnaya Street stand in a destroyed cemetery. In the first year, residents of the house, which would later be called “Evening Minsk,” saw how, after heavy rains, skulls and bones were washed out of the ground on the slope of a hill cut by builders. When they were digging a foundation pit for the Palace of Art, children from all over the area came running to watch the graveyard being demolished. Broken coffins, destroyed crypts, and gravestones were taken outside the city. Everyone was sure that the builders had secretly enriched themselves, because there could have been valuable things in the ancient tombs. The opening of the palace took place in 1973.

The cemetery was finally destroyed in 1980, leaving only a small part of the former territory untouched. They set about restoring the church: where the crypts of its founders were, they made a wardrobe, installed an electric organ made in Czechoslovakia in the apse, decorated the windows with stained glass and donated it to the Philharmonic. A chamber music hall was opened here.

Only in 2006 the church and its territory were completely returned to the believers. One of the best organs in Belarus stands behind the altar - concerts and festivals are still held. The gravestones found near the church were compiled into architectural compositions. In September this year, 12 more tombstones were returned to the cemetery, discovered by local historians in a landfill near Sennitsa.

House with execution registration

The first transformations on Zolotaya Gorka began in 1934. On the square in front of the church at the corner of Sovetskaya and 1st Dolgobrodskaya streets (now Kozlova Street), construction began on a huge building with one hundred apartments for the new elite - the first House of Specialists in Minsk.

Architect Natalya Makletsova, a 25-year-old graduate of the Leningrad Institute, designed the building to block the view of the church. The house was built directly on the slope of the cemetery hill, separating the courtyard with a small retaining wall.

This was an event in the construction practice of Minsk. The first residential building with a six-story middle part, with elevators (which, however, were never connected) and a basement. The building had its own grocery store and bakery. When other Minsk residents huddled in communal apartments, specialists were allocated three- and four-room apartments.

The house on Sovetskaya, 148 was occupied in 1936. Architects Arkady Bregman and Alexander Voinov, writer Zmitrok Byadulya, poet Izi Kharik, the first People's Artist of the BSSR Vladislav Golubok and many others lived here - academicians, artists, military and party leaders.

When in 1937 Alexander Chervyakov and other “responsible workers” who committed suicide were carried to the Military Cemetery on 1st Dolgobrodskaya past their windows for burial, most of the residents already faced an equally terrible fate, which decades later can be reduced to a short note: “ Shot. Rehabilitated."

At the end of September, Vladislav Golubok was shot, a month later - Izi Kharik, when from October 29 to 30, 1937, about 130 Belarusian cultural figures were liquidated in one night in the basements of the NKVD prison in Minsk. 80 years later, their poems are heard again as songs in the project “(Un)stralated poetry” performed by Dmitry Voityushkevich and Svetlana Ben.

During two years of repression, most apartments changed owners several times. In 1938, the 64th changed four residents in less than three weeks. The house was inhabited by “dead souls”; printing houses did not have time to reflect changes in address books.

The house with bad apartments did not last even seven years. During an air raid in June 1941, the neighborhood was almost razed to the ground. The ruins of the House of Specialists opened up a view of the Church of St. Roja. The house opposite (now Nezavisimosti Ave., 43) was more fortunate - it survived and even ended up on the pages of the fascist newspaper Minsker Zeitung as an example of typical Soviet housing. After the war, it was called the House of Scientists and Writers - Zmitrok Byadulya and Yanka Bryl, a dynasty of outstanding doctors, actors, ballerinas, and translators lived here.

The house was inhabited by "dead souls" printing houses did not have time to reflect changes in address books

The poetess Natalya Tatur was born in building 43 and remembers that while the architects were deciding what to put on the site of the House of Specialists, fear still lived in the building opposite: “No one put the children to bed until two o’clock in the morning. We had a communal apartment - the neighbors came to us and drank tea until late, told jokes, but no one paid attention to me, sitting under the table. Suddenly everyone fell silent, and the silence was ominous. Outside the window, the distinct sound of a car approaching the house was heard. The entrance door slammed. Everyone turned pale. They tried to guess what kind of entrance it was based on the number. The atmosphere at the table became increasingly tense. Everyone began to whisper. Someone was being escorted out of the entrance - the door of the arriving car slammed again. The silence was already ringing. The entrance door again. Which one? It seems like the third one. The next one is ours. The next door door slams again. The car starts and drives away. “Lapanka,” as these arrests were called, is over for today. Now you can go to bed. Tomorrow everything will start all over again."

Cosmopolitan architect

The ruins of the House of Specialists stood until 1948. In the same year, Professor Mikhail Barshch was dismissed from the Moscow Architectural Institute, accused of cosmopolitanism. Having secured support in Minsk, the architect came to Belarus.

“The city looked terrible, the center was complete ruins of brick and rubble. From under heaps of broken bricks and rubble, pipes of temporary huts stick out here and there, with smoke coming out of them. The newly built houses and some that have survived stand out strangely against the background of the general destruction,” these were his first impressions of Minsk.

When in 1950 they decided to build a new house with 200 apartments on the site of the ruins for workers and employees of the radio plant named after. Molotov (now Minsk Instrument-Making Plant), the project was entrusted to Mikhail Osipovich.

The architect studied estates, ancient temples and old paintings in museums and implemented ideas in the Stalinist Empire style. There was a struggle between “constructivists” and “decorators”, to which Mikhail Barshch belonged. The construction of house 44 on Stalin Avenue was completed in 1955, and despite the struggle with excesses, the front facade was exactly as intended.

The house of impressive size and broken configuration seems to consist of several buildings. Initially, the entrance with a colonnade at the level of the two upper floors was occupied by the plant's dormitory. In the evenings, workers held dances on the sites. There was a kindergarten in the semi-basement. On November 1, 1967, the editorial office of the new newspaper “Evening Minsk” moved into the corner entrance and has not changed its address for half a century. House 44 stands not only on the avenue, but also on the logo of the newspaper, having received its own name from it.

Gradually, scientific and creative intelligentsia settled in “Evening Minsk”. But the world was again uneasy - the Cold War was going on and the ranks of dissidents were growing.

Two towers

To prevent citizens from listening to foreign radio stations at night, the leadership of the USSR decided back in 1949 to “jam” foreign propaganda. The country is entangled in a network of noise and interference transmitters.

Minsk “jammers” were hidden in the courtyard of 44 houses - two hundred-meter iron towers with four-lobe antennas. Not everyone was ready to put up with this. In 1963, Minsk student Sergei Khanzhenkov, a demolition worker by profession, prepared a suitcase of explosives for the hated radio station. He spent his ten years of strict regime in the camps of Mordovia, next to other famous dissidents - Sinyavsky, Daniel, Ginzburg, and then returned to Minsk.

Sergei Khanzhenkov willingly talked about unfulfilled hopes to the Izvestia correspondent: “The idea arose - to blow up the jammer! God forbid, no blood! Purely demonstrative act. Just one evening, thousands of people will turn on their radios as usual, and the air will be clear. There will definitely be talk: they blew up the “silencer”! What is a “silencer”? Why is it needed at all? And the people will perk up.”

Jamming stopped only during perestroika. In the early 90s, one of the towers was dismantled, the antennas on the second were changed, adapting them for transmitting cellular signals. New residents moved into house 44, not suspecting that in the yard was the very object No. 3 that they wanted to blow up.

“I don’t know any other place where I could sleep so peacefully”

Nina Nikolaevna

I purchased a four-room apartment at 44 Nezavisimosti Avenue

I was born in Leningrad and spent some part of my life there. I really like that Minsk is so similar to my hometown. This is not surprising, because it was built by Leningrad and Moscow architects.

In Leningrad we had an apartment with high ceilings in a beautiful house. All the best things come from childhood, so in Minsk I liked an apartment in such an iconic building, I bought it 25 years ago. Three families moved in at once - mom and dad, and other relatives. We invited everyone. Like all parents, they dreamed of living with their children. My daughter said that she would be with us, but years later, naturally, she changed her mind. Now the two of us with my husband in a hundred-meter apartment are too spacious.

When the renovation was being done, I came up with and approved a rather radical redevelopment, but, of course, the small details, the authentic stucco molding on the ceiling, were left. All the stucco has been restored; we called a master from the film studio. The walls were also leveled with plaster, and not with plasterboard, as they do now. When the parquet was replaced, the joists were updated. We tried not to deviate from the technologies with which the house was created.

By this time, I had lived in Europe and seen how space was organized there. We combined the kitchen and living room. Using the corridor that previously led to the kitchen, we expanded the bathroom and even found space for a second small bathroom. Two adjacent bedrooms were divided - now the bedroom and study have their own doors. The redevelopment made the apartment comfortable for us.

I used to work and rent housing in Europe - in Italy, Austria - it’s probably easier to list the countries I haven’t been to. For example, I brought that painting from Venice. I am in love with this city, it also reminds me of Leningrad.

I came up with the design of the apartment myself. She was the first to purchase a white kitchen with emerald Venetian glass and began to do the entire interior in white and green. The furniture was brought from Italy, because in 1995 there was simply no such thing here, double-glazed windows were from Poland.

It is important to me that there is one big room that unites everyone. And at the same time, everyone could retire to their own space, close the door behind them and work or relax. I don’t understand the fashionable desire to put a TV in every room - one in the common room is enough, but you need to sleep in the bedrooms. And I must say that you sleep very well here.

I was never worried about the proximity of the cemetery. It seems that after the war there is not a single place in the center of Minsk that was not built “on bones,” because during air raids people also died under the ruins. But this place is next to the church, prayed for, and you can feel a special atmosphere. On weekends, beautiful couples get married to the sound of beautiful ringing, and in the evening you can hear the sound of an organ. We have ash parquet; they used to make floors in churches from it - jokes aside, but perhaps this also protects our peaceful sleep.

My parents also moved a lot from place to place; my father was a military man. He was supposed to be transferred to Belarus, and I went to enroll at BSU, but in the end he was sent to another place. I stayed to study in Minsk, then got married. She completed her graduate studies and defended her dissertation in Moscow. She studied molecular virology and traveled a lot, like a real cosmopolitan.

In 1986, she went to America for the first time. I was a member of the board of the Soviet-American Friendship Society. It was in Reykjavik that Gorbachev signed a cooperation agreement, and the next morning we flew to New York. I had never been abroad before - I tried to keep up the brand. We were supervised by American doctors: there I saw non-surgical removal of kidney stones and in vitro fertilization.

I remember how in Soviet times I couldn’t get in line for an apartment. We lived in a one-room apartment near Komarovka: with a living space of 20 meters, and according to the standard of 6 meters per person, there was a surplus. Candidates of Science were entitled to an office, but since there was none in the apartment, it was not taken into account. When it became possible to buy a home, we chose this option.

This apartment is unique. There are only six of these in the huge house - they start from the third floor directly above the arches that connect the side five-story parts of the house with the seven-story part. In the middle one there are elevators located in glass bay windows, but we only have stairs, and getting to the fifth floor can be difficult.

The neighbors are very good and intelligent. There are many shops in the house, across the road is "Ocean", TSUM is nearby. Transport stops are right under the windows, you can get anywhere in 15 minutes. Minsk residents like to joke about the metro: “For the first cars it’s “Yakub Kolas Square”, and for the last ones it’s “Victory Square”.

Now I have temporarily put the apartment up for sale along with all its furnishings, and I really don’t want to part with it. But we no longer need such a big one. The children have moved away, and my husband and I are spending more and more time in our country house. I like living in the center of Minsk - my girlfriends are here, life is in full swing, but my husband is comfortable outside the city.

It would be nice to buy a two-room apartment in the same area, my soul has become attached to it. Small, in a building with elevators, so you can live comfortably. It’s so interesting to know what “A-100” will build on the site of the trolleybus depot. You in The Village find out soon, please. According to the plan, houses should be built in the Stalinist style.

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If you're the owner of an old home, then you've probably at some point wondered who slept in your bedroom long before you, when the plumbing was last replaced, or why that ghost keeps hiding your car keys. Investigating the history of your home is not only a fascinating journey into the past, but also an opportunity to learn how it was built and how it should be maintained. To explore the history of your home, try these steps.

Steps

Visit your local courthouse or historical society. They have access to your home's official serial number. When it comes to land and property, the most official accounting is done using a completely different system, the address you are familiar with is taken into account (especially since addresses and street names change over time).

• In older areas, the land property registration system itself may have changed over time. Local, state or county land record offices or local historical societies should be able to find the official parcel number (or equivalent) associated with your home. This will help the rest of your research go smoothly.

1. While you're there, ask for a copy of the original building permit. The building permit is usually a treasure trove of information, including the home's original dimensions, construction dates and costs, as well as the names of the architects, contractors, and/or original owners.

   • Check with the historical society or county courthouse for a copy of the permit.
   • Note that there may be a small fee for their services (someone needs to dust off the old archives at least occasionally), but it is still a good price for the expensive information contained in these documents.

2. Dig out and get a new copy of your property statement. This is a document that contains all the deeds and legal transactions related to your property. This will give you information about all the previous owners of your home. You may have received a copy of this when you purchased your home, otherwise, go back to the county courthouse (or print it out and bring it with you as a checklist)!

   • View the history of purchase and sale price changes. Sometimes a significant increase in the sales price over a short period of time usually means that a building or premises has been completed or that major renovations have been made. Check the building permit, which lists the building types, construction dates, details and owner(s).
   • If you live in the United States, visit your local or county courthouse to view the land registry. The register is usually kept at the land registry office or records office. Ask for a register of records specifically for your property.
   • In the United States, this information is indexed by city lot and block number, as well as the division of township areas and rural property.

3. Browse your city's newspaper archives. They can usually be found in the library, although you might try your luck at a historical society or county courthouse, where they can give you an overview of the current state of affairs.

   • Look for references to construction in the neighborhood, previous property owners, and any listings for sale or rental related to your address. If you're lucky, you might even find old photos.
   • Search in the past. Street names and numbers change over time, so don't jump straight into old records expecting to find familiar landmarks.
   • Find a suitable time period. If you know, for example, when your home was built or skyrocketed in value, do an extra thorough search around that event in sections like "buildings" and "architecture."

4. Visit your local council planning authority. Find the office that issues building permits, assesses property taxes, or records home sales. They should also have public records related to your home. Often older homes may change hands through a will or other transfer of property, and this information may not be included in the registry. You can look at topographic maps to find information about parts of the building that have been added or demolished.

   • In life, we can only be sure of two things, one of them is taxes, so an excellent place to start your search would be the office of the appraiser of the area under his jurisdiction. The assessor keeps a record of the taxable value, which may include old appraisals that describe the home in great detail. You can also check old city directories (retired telephone books containing a list of houses by address), county history, demographic statistics, and census data.

5. Inspect your home thoroughly. You can learn a lot just by looking around it. Familiarize yourself with how it was built and what type of building materials were used.

   • Inspect the walls and profile of the house. Look for original materials, such as fireplace bricks.
   • The design of a home may have changed dramatically over the years, and you may find some clues as to when your home was built, what significant changes it has gone through, and what the original owners' income was.
   • Try looking under the toilet water tank cap. Under the cover there is usually a date stamp, which will give you the approximate time of when your house was built, since the toilet was presumably installed shortly after it was built. Once you're done, be sure to put the cover back on.
   • You can also get an idea of ​​how long ago the rooms were remodeled. For example, different styles of cabinets and appliances in the kitchen go in and out of fashion every few years. Brown tartan wallpaper or an avocado-colored refrigerator, the '70s screamed louder than a room full of disco dancers singing Y.M.C.A.

6. Talk to your neighbors. If you're new to the area and want to find out the history of your home, longtime neighbors can help.

   • Ask them which previous tenants they know and if the tenants have had any renovations done that they can remember. Plus, asking your neighbors about your home is a great way to break the ice between you.
   • If they look at you strangely and, after asking, “Don’t you know...?”, run away without even offering you a cookie, then there’s a really interesting story hiding in your old house!
   • If you and your neighbors become good friends, you may even be able to ask permission to study the structure of their house to get clues about your own. In some areas there are many similar houses built at the same time (so-called model houses), either for practicality or to follow the latest architectural trends.
   • For example, according to The New York Times, porch canopies were extremely popular in the '50s and '60s in New York City, but they are now falling out of fashion and many homeowners are trying to remove the eyesore.
   • In 50 years, homeowners will be paying a huge amount of money to have their old home modernized with the latest fashion and eye-catching feature: a porch overhang.

7. Find the previous owners to find out what improvements were made. Ownership information can also be obtained by tracing the ownership history of the land. Once you know who owned the land before you, find them using an Internet search function or use the many commercial services available to find people. Talking to former owners will give you a better idea of ​​the home's original condition. Of course, this is easier said than done, especially if you are looking for an owner who died hundreds of years ago. In this case, you may need professional help in matters of this nature. As Marshall McLuhan said, “The medium is the message.”

   Research the history of your area. There may be much more information available about your area than about your home, and it can make a huge contribution to immersing the history of your home. For very old houses, which for example are mainly found in most of Europe, information about the surrounding area may be the only information about the early history of the house.

   Gather any information you can to create a chronological picture of your home. Find out how and when it was built, when various parts were added or removed, and what natural phenomena may have contributed to the changes.

8. Consider using a metal detector in your yard. Metal detectors are a great way to discover old coins and other artifacts that can add their own unique touch to your home's history. You may also find the key to a locked door in the basement that no one has ever entered. No, wait... don't go in there...

   • Take advantage of free services offered on the Internet (eg Thatsmyoldhouse.com in English). This site allows people to share information about their old homes and changes they have made, share memories, etc. Free access to site services and search.
   • Try finding photos of your home from years past or of homes in your neighborhood to get an idea of ​​the changes that have occurred since the photos were taken.
   • If you will be making many copies in government archives or libraries, always ask how much you need to pay per copy (if cost information is not available).
   • Visit your local history museum or research online.
   • Find like-minded people.
   • Use help desks and computers to find the information you need. Look for historical documents and address lists of former owners.

   Warnings

   • Be careful when infringing on the privacy of previous owners or their relatives. They may have painful memories that they don't want to remember, or they simply don't want to be bothered. Sometimes, it is better to collect information without contacting former residents personally. Either way, respect their wishes if they don't want to take the time to talk to you.
   • Be careful when handling fragile, old documents. These may be the only records available. Protect documents with clear archival sleeves (available at art or craft stores) and store documents in folders. Folders will be useful in some situations.