#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. The buildings’ colors were determined by the natural materials used in construction. Therefore, different shades of gray and pale sand tones predominated: darker at the bottom, lighter at the top.
According to recollections, even the prime minister of the USSR Alexey Kosygin, who visited Norilsk in 1968, drew attention to the monotony of the houses’ colors and promised to send the northerners 600 tons of Swedish paint that would withstand the most severe frosts. Whether he sent it or not is unknown. But in the 1970s, the facades of Norilsk houses really became brighter: deep carmine and rich ocher appeared.
In those years, the color scheme of Leninsky prospekt was specially worked out by such famous architects as Larisa Nazarova and Alexander Sorokin. They also suggested using calm, pastel colors.
This is how architect Larisa Nazarova spoke about the search for color solutions for Norilsk buildings in her memoirs:
“At the beginning of summer, exterior renovation work was carried out every year, the city became neat, bright and joyful. But bad weather came, and the surface layer of paint was washed off and gradually became gloomy again. In those days there were no high-quality dyes; they painted with whatever they had, even diluting white and brown oil paint for interior work. I remember that in search of local building materials, they began to burn local material and got a pink color. As a result, houses acquired the color of suckling pigs with brown caps.
We experimentally painted a couple of facades in a Western style, mixing yellow and bright red panels. But we were disappointed by the bright colors of the buildings, which seemed harsh against the backdrop of the sky and snow-white mountains in the distance.
Only much later, somewhere in the late 1970s, when Finnish frost-resistant paints were brought, the city began to recover from gloomy colors”.
In the History Spot’s photo project, we talked about how Norilsk residents celebrated the New Year in 1941.
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Text: Svetlana Ferapontova, Photo: Nornickel Polar Branch archive
