Description of the attraction
The mansion for Prussian citizens, glassmakers Frankov in 1900 was designed and built by the architect Academician V. Schaub, the brightest architect of the late 19th - early 20th centuries, one of the pioneers of architectural modernity in St. Petersburg. The construction of this mansion marked a new round of St. Petersburg architecture - historicism flowed into Art Nouveau.
The building of the mansion has an unusual L-shape, which favorably emphasizes the asymmetry of the entire composition. The front facade is made with two asymmetrical projections, completed by triangular tongs, the construction of which has been lost. The risalit on the left is complemented by a rectangular ledge, on the right, it is pierced by the arch of the main entrance.
The interior layout is made according to the principle of maximum functional practicality. The hall smoothly passes into the dining room, which opens into the courtyard with a glazed faceted ledge. Wide openings pierce the inner wall of the main staircase, in a word, one of the dominant tendencies in modern architecture towards integration and flow of spaces is clearly traced in the mansion.
The unusual facade of Frank's house immediately attracts attention due to the desire for free construction and the rhythmic variety of facades. In this regard, the side of the mansion is especially curious, this variability in the shape and size of the windows, projecting the inner content onto the outer form. Freedom-loving architectural innovations first manifested themselves precisely at the front front of street development, where the architect was least of all dependent on established rules.
The interior decoration and furnishings of the mansion represent a logically completed artistic ensemble in the characteristic traditions of early modernism, which was almost completely lost over time. The richness of serpentine lines of rhythmically intertwined floral patterns, the multicolored iridescence of glass and ceramics created an atmosphere that soared above everyday life, saturated with sublime emotions.
Since the main occupation of the owner of the mansion is stained-glass decoration, glazing of windows and glass production, it is not surprising that stained-glass windows took not the last place in the decoration of the interiors of the house. The windows are decorated in the best traditions of stained glass and mosaics of St. Petersburg Art Nouveau, and all stained glass windows were made nearby, in neighboring buildings owned by the Northern Glass Industrial Society.
The owner of the house, M. Frank, being an architect by training and being a co-founder of the society, most likely took part in the interior decoration, striving to see the advanced achievements of decorative glazing in his house. For the dining room window, the most significant stained glass window was made, depicting five female figurines gathering fruits under the shining rays of the sun. Unfortunately, neither the stained glass windows nor the decoration of the mansion's interiors have survived to this day. The house was badly damaged during the Great Patriotic War.
Frank's house was restored by the forces of the Mechanobr Institute - a research and design institute for the machining of minerals, which had been in Frank's house since 1921. After the closure of the research institute, the Museum of the History of the Development of Mineral Processing was created in the building, and then, in the 1990s, part of the premises was rented for offices, and part was occupied by the Consulate General of Norway.
In 1995, the premises of Frank's house were transferred to the Faculty of Medicine of St. Petersburg University. In 2007, the premises underwent a major internal renovation. Now the interior decoration of the house contains little that contains from the former luxury, the former style, from all the former splendor - only the layout itself, the marble staircase and wooden beams have survived.
