Description of the attraction
There are buildings about which, after the first viewing, I would like to know in more detail their history, motives of construction and the purpose of every detail in architecture. One of these houses is majestically located in the very center of the "Saratov Arbat" on Kirov Avenue.
The history of the house begins in 1911, when the merchant Tikhomirov (real estate dealer) bought the courtyard place of Prince Kutkin on Nemetskaya Street (nowadays - Kirov Avenue) for the construction of a hotel. The process was complicated by the First World War, and the construction lasted about five years.
Statues of knights, an open gallery on the fourth floor of the building takes us to the world of medieval tournaments, and massive pylons rushing into the sky emphasize the uniqueness of the architecture. All this "fabulous" luxury was designed by Ivan Kirillovich Kalistratov, no matter how paradoxical it may sound, in the fall of 1917. Sketches of sculptures of medieval knights and messengers belong to Pavel Fedorovich Dunduk, according to legend, symbolizing the guards of peace of the guests.
The hotel received the name "Astoria", apparently in memory of the fashionable hotels in New York (the owners of the hotels were the Astor brothers). But the hotel owner could not enjoy the luxury and grandeur of his "brainchild": he was repressed as a "bourgeois", and government agencies settled in the building. But in 1925 the Astoria Hotel opened its doors to guests again, and shops and a restaurant were opened on the ground floor.
In 1956 the hotel was renamed "Volga", but the architecture of the facade remained the same. It has the status of an architectural monument of the early twentieth century and is considered the second (after the conservatory) symbol of the city of Saratov.
