Russia's Eiffel Tower

Imagine if Paris authorities abandoned the Eiffel Tower, squandered funds for its restoration, and then, when the situation became truly dire, proposed that it be dismantled and moved.

Sounds monstrous, no? Yet that's exactly what Russian officials want to do with Moscow's Shukhov Tower, an engineering masterpiece near historic Shabolovka Street, built in 1922 by the engineer Vladimir Shukhov.

The tower's owner, the Russian TV and Radio Network (RTRS), proposed that the tower be dismantled and moved to another, as yet unspecified, location. The tower is currently in serious need of repair – the last overhaul was completed in 1992. In 2011, budget funds were allocated for restoration work, but nothing was done.

In the waning years of the last century, the tower was still being used at full capacity, and despite its deteriorating condition, loaded down with additional satellite dishes. But in 2002 the tower was taken out of service.

Shukhov's tower is an engineering wonder. It required four times less metal to construct than the Eiffel Tower, its usual standard of comparison. To this day, skyscrapers, communications towers, and antennae worldwide are still being designed using the same principles: Shukhov's gridshell can be found in the British Museum's Great Court and the Smithsonian's art gallery, among many others. The tower was the first of its kind, a symbol of the excellence of twentieth century Russian engineers. Professor of architecture Natalia Dushkina credits the tower with marking “the beginning of twentieth century ‘high-tech' architecture, and laying the foundation for twenty-first century architecture.”

A bit of history: the tower was constructed on one of Moscow's highest points, on land belonging to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which also housed a strategic military radio station. Military radio operators took an interest in Shukhov's proposal for a self-supporting hyperbolic structure, on which they could install extremely tall antennae without expending much additional material.

“After the Red Army's crushing defeat at Warsaw in 1920,” explained historian Fyodor Sofronov, “the military had a pressing need for quality radio. It was then that the strategic importance of remote means of communication became apparent.”

Despite the harsh conditions of post-revolutionary economic crisis and the shortage of materials and labor, Shukhov finished his tower in just two years. He was personally in charge of construction, adjusting the structure's design and construction on the fly, which makes it a uniquely creative project.

In recent years Moscow has witnessed a series of unfounded, even illegal demolitions and reconstructions of architectural landmarks, but when bureaucrats' attention turned to the famous tower on Shabolovka, the world responded with a wave of indignation. Both Russian and international experts assert that RTRS's project is infeasible. The tower's structure is too complex to just “take it apart” and then “reassemble it” somewhere else. Most importantly, notes Konstantin Mikhailov, coordinator of the movement ArkhNadzor (Architectural Oversight), “dismantling the tower is not only unnecessary for restoration, it presents a real danger to the landmark – the structure is not the kind that can be safely taken apart, and so its dismantling will replace the landmark itself with a modern ‘remake'.”

Vladimir Shukhov's great-grandson, Vladimir Fyodorovich Shukhov, also an engineer, echoed Mikhailov's sentiments. “The tower cannot physically be relocated,” he told residents and activists at a March 16 meeting, “without damaging the original structure.”

As soon as the relocation proposal was submitted to the government for review, locals began to protest in defense of the tower, against its unlawful relocation from the historic neighborhood where it is the main landmark. In March, experts on architecture and engineering history from Russian and international preservation organizations conducted a series of free educational tours of the tower, as well as lectures on its architectural, cultural, and historic context.

“It would only be a difference in scale to similarly suggest that we dismantle the Egyptian pyramids and move them somewhere else,” said local resident Ilya Malkov, an ArkhNadzor activist and guide on a tour of Shabolovka's historical sites.

Sights like Shukhov's Tower become entwined with memories and associations, with their surroundings – that is what makes them cultural landmarks. Many local residents who signed a March petition in defense of the tower commented that it fits naturally within the surrounding Shabolovka landscape, which is famous for its early Soviet-era residential architecture.

Like any architectural masterpiece, the tower has imprinted different associations on different people: in its lightness it is reminiscent of the dynamism and ambition of the early revolutionary period, while its silhouette recalls Russian Orthodox bell towers – after all, Shukhov looked to another high point in Moscow's skyline, Novodevichy Monastery, for inspiration.

The tower was itself a departure point for urban planners developing the surrounding Danilovsky neighborhood. Throughout the 1920s, the area was gradually filled in with unique residential complexes: Georgy Volfenzon's commune house (1925-1927), and a residential block by rationalist architects (1929-1931). Shukhov's Tower became the link between the neighborhood's pre-revolutionary architecture, which includes the ancient Donskoy and Danilovsky monasteries, and its more modern buildings. For those who grew up in the USSR, the tower became a national symbol, not least because for many years it was used in the opening montages of many popular TV shows.

The movement to preserve the tower has attracted the interest of local residents, many of whom view its relocation as a threat to the overall feel of the neighborhood. Anna Bronovitsky, an architectural historian, worries that the tower's relocation may mark the beginning of redevelopment in this historic neighborhood that lies to the south of central Moscow.

However the biggest threat, according to experts and activists, is the direct violation of cultural heritage preservation laws, which state that a cultural landmark is inseparable from its location. As yet, no experts have published findings that would justify the need to relocate the tower.

It is also worrying that the project proposal contains no explanation of the tower's future, only indicating that there will be “further discussions regarding the tower's alternative location elsewhere in Moscow and regarding the financing of the tower's final reconstruction.” In other words, the relocation plan has no set place, and no set funding, and would create a precedent that threatens both individual landmarks and entire neighborhoods. If today they relocate the tower “who knows where,” tomorrow they might do the same with the unique residential buildings of the 1920's and 30's, whose number in Moscow is steadily dwindling. “Everyone talks about the tower,” Malkov said, “but the fate of the adjacent turn-of-the-century buildings – the church and Varvarinsky orphanage – is just as murky.”

Of course, not all residents feel that the Shukhov tower and other old buildings need to be rescued. For them, the tower's dismantling would mean profound and long-awaited changes for the neighborhood, and the potential for a more modern living space. One neighborhood resident, Natalia (who declined to give her last name), attended one of the Shabolovka history tours and said that, while she sympathizes with the tower's defenders, she nonetheless supports the need for change.

After the constructivist Donskiye bathhouses (1934) were demolished last year – the first of a series of demolitions in the neighborhood – Natalia said she felt “a relief, like if you have an old, useless thing in your room, and you feel kind of bad throwing it out, but then when you finally do get rid of it, you see how clean and spacious everything looks.” Dushkina added that, for both regional authorities and local residents, anything “Soviet” is often looked upon as part of an unpleasant experience rather than as part of a cultural heritage in need of preservation.

The Shukhov Tower is obviously not the first landmark to be threatened and defended. It is, however, unique in its importance, its historic and cultural value, and the urgency of the threat to its existence. Experts have cause for alarm: rebuilding projects turning into “remakes” has become a common trend in Moscow for over a decade (Russian Life first reported on this phenomenon in August 1995). Restorations (conserving original materials, dimensions, and parts) become reconstructions (rebuilding from scratch), which undermines the very idea of cultural and artistic value.

The case for the Shukhov Tower now looks particularly bleak. It has been recognized as a federal cultural landmark since 1987, but its owner refuses to view it as such, and is pushing through the dismantling project despite professional backlash. On March 7, experts spoke out against the demolition in the Moscow Public Chamber, yet the relocation project proposal was submitted the same day. The petition in defense of the Shukhov Tower has been signed by international experts and organizations, including renowned architects Rem Koolhaas and Norman Foster (the latter uses Shukhov's gridshells in his work, including in London's famous “Gherkin”).

Appeals from international architecture stars continue to pour in, calling for the preservation of the tower in its current form and location, and the World Monuments Fund has expressed its “deep concern for the pitiful state of many examples of avant-garde architecture in Russia.”

Judging from the wide use of avant-garde-inspired imagery in the Sochi Olympic Opening Ceremony, the Russian government sees value in the symbolic use of such art and architecture to bolster its international prestige. Yet when it comes to concrete cases of protecting that art and architecture for future generations, the state seems to find little value in historic preservation. RL