Paper long abstract:

Garages in Bishkek represent another legacy of Soviet urban planning. In Soviet times, people did not leave their cars on the street. Usually, the territories were allocated to various garage cooperatives, where car owners installed their own metal garages. Less commonly, residents have built brick garages in their courtyards. Such courtyard garages and garage cooperatives were built throughout the cities of the entire Soviet Union. The city of Frunze alsi had many garages. In Soviet times, garages were not only a place to store cars, but also important places for socialization. Men came here to escape from their wives, to drink in the company of other motorists, to play cards, play nardy, or just chat. Often, garages became places for May-day parties and celebrations, to which neighbors brought food and baked goods; music was played and meat barbequed. This was possible because the garage owners were often neighbors, worked in the same enterprises, and, accordingly, knew each other quite well. Today this practice no longer exists. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, many residents of Frunze left for Russia, selling apartments and garages at low costs to the internal migrants from the regions. Therefore, the social fabric that once united the neighbors came apart and garages now perform only their direct function. As the city expands and grows in height, garage areas become tidbits for developers, so garage owners are not sure how long they will be able to keep their garages. But while they are still here, the garages represent an important component of the city's morphological ensemble and an interesting part of material Soviet legacy.

Paper long abstract:

The Southern part of Bishkek has two very unique architectural objects located just next to each other: Hotel Issyk-Kul and Manas Village. The first represents a modernist style Soviet architecture, while the second one – post-Soviet experimentations with new national Kyrgyz approach to architectural form. Both were very progressive and advanced at the times when they were built. However, today, both are in a very ruinated condition: the hotel is completely abandoned, while the Manas village was almost completely taken over by trees and grass. In my paper, I am exploring the phenomenon of urban ruination and abandonment existing just next to the new flashy developments and constructions. It is the story of global capitalism taking over both soviet and national ideologies.

Paper long abstract:

Bishkek mahallas

Bishkek is usually perceived as a Russian or Soviet city with the regular rectangular grid street pattern and Russian or Soviet style buildings. It is rarely associated with traditional Central Asian urban fabric with meandering streets often found in the older Central Asian cities, such as Bukhara, Khiva, Samarqand, or even Osh for that matter. Yet, if we look a little bit closer at the regular grid of Bishkek, we can find in it some islands of irregularity – urban neighborhoods that have more picturesque and irregular streets and more traditional Central Asian houses. City residents call such areas mahallas, similar to how they are called in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Southern Kyrgyzstan. In this paper, I will look describe three of such mahallas in Bishkek: Tokoldosh, Kuznechnaya Krepost and Shlagbaum. I will discuss the history and morphology of these unique urban spaces and the stories of people who live there.

Paper long abstract:

Soviet architecture inspires today more than ever. And not just with its modernistic style or its ideological context but with its utopian potential - its absolute form. What is the form or what is the possibility of architecture - is not merely stylistic rhetorical question, it gives its political element. Just two, three decades ago soviet architecture was condemned and disliked but today it looks like a treasure, however in decay, and still capable to surprise. what was absolute utopian forms now gives itself to be newly re-fictionalized re-narrativized, yet from another perspectives.