Real USSR » soviet houses

Work and Travel

eugenia — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 21:50:46 +0000

Hard work and no play

A good-sized Soviet factory usually consisted of up to a hundred industrial divisions, with 200–800 workers in each. They had to be accommodated, fed, and often educated, and typically to the Soviet way of doing things, that often wasn’t handled very well. So if you ever wondered what it would be like to be a young engineer at a large factory in the Soviet Russia — please read on.

Eat

The team leaders, heads of departments and the executives of any factory would dine separately and their cafeteria would differ significantly from the one for the regular staff. An executive canteen would have nice tablecloths, waitresses, paper napkins, flowers and subdued music. The menu would be extensive and could include trout, lamb and pork cutlets, plenty of meat in borsht and fresh croutons for the soups. Well, the working class canteen would be exactly the opposite.

Lining up to up

The idea of conveyer type service was borrowed from the US as it allowed letting many staff through in a timely manner. Well, that wasn’t the case in a typical Soviet canteen. There would often be queues, lack of clean trays, shortage of tables and rude staff – oh, those workers of Soviet canteens! Usually a middle-aged lady with bad temper and poor manners; they were said to be taking the nice cuts of meat and poultry home. One day there could be a book written on the tricks of the Soviet canteen workers – what they did to balance out the shortages! For instance, if you want to keep half a kilo of sour cream to yourself, you cannot simply dilute the rest with water – that could show up if the inspection came to check. No, they would use a cheaper yoghurt (kefir) or rancid milk – and often the sour cream served in those canteens was as liquid as milk. The menu was also unimaginative, with very little meat in soups or stews, but with plenty of over-cooked pasta and over boiled potatoes.

Drink

A regular Soviet factory worker would receive 1 rouble from his wife for the daily spends. Why the wife and why so little? The problem of alcoholism was an acute one. Since the jobs were very demanding physically and drinking was often the only known way of relaxation (not to mention the peer pressure!), it was impossible for the workers not to drink. Of course, bringing alcohol to work was not allowed, but there were ways around it. Like, pay a goods driver to bring you a bottle with a delivery. Or, even better, ethanol – used widely as a solvent, or a as cleanser for machine parts, it was a very popular drink.

Beer queue, circa 1987

As everyone was paid monthly, pay day drinking was part of industrial culture – the joke went that it was drinking “for the reason”, unlike any other day.

Alcohol and alcoholism were certainly berated; and the punishment was two-fold: moral and material. The drinkers were openly reprimanded at staff meetings; satiric caricatures were drawn and displayed, but if nothing helped, the punishment became more tangible: no bonuses, time off in winter (there was even a joke: You’ve got to hate warm beer and sweaty women, take some time off in Feb!) and potentially even medical rehabilitation. However, it was very rare for a drunkard to be fired: the country needed all labour force it could have.

Stay

The accommodation for factory workers was provided and almost free; the only thing was that it was of a peculiar character. The accommodating houses of communal living were of three types: male, female and family-oriented. The last type was probably the most decent of all, as a family would usually get a room of their own. The singles had to share: usually not the most capacious room would have to fit between two to three single beds. Nothing was private: if we said that the space allocation was about 5sq m, this would not mean per person – that would mean per room, and one was lucky to be able to share with friends! There would be a couple of showers for the floor, and maybe a couple of toilets. Typically guys would not be allowed even to stay overnight – event to visit the gals was forbidden! The kitchen was communal with a few cooking stoves/ovens – borsht or meatballs often went missing if left unattended!

The law and order would be guarded by a Commandant — and this is not a figure of speech, this was actually an official title! A woman in her late 50s, usually with a mean character and a lot of unresolved issues, this lady would be very susceptible to bribes and all sorts of favour – for allowing a visitor, for coming in after the doors were locked (and they were usually locked by 10pm, with no access granted. The latecomers might as well had sleep on the street, for what a Commandant would care!).

This is what is could look like, brand new.

Work

So how come that the Soviet manufacturing went belly up? The prime reason for it was the inability to sustain any competition. The items for everyday use (TV sets, washing machines, even cars or irons) were not user-friendly and just outright ugly. The situation was even more complex with heavier manufacturing. Anybody who had visited a factory which built planes in late 1970s or early 1980s would recall what a gloomy look it had. The technological rules were broken as much and as often as it could only be: the only help was an extremely high number of manual controllers.

The waste rates were as high as 80% of the total items produced. Hardly any metal was cast: the majority was about the metal cutting, which was ineffective and costly. The technologies which were getting a wider use in the West (lasers, blast moulding, precise cast) were still unheard of. Robots were still exotic as; nothing was automated. All the machinery was Soviet-made, often dated back to 1930s and 1940s. All graphics and design was done manually, with pencils, erasers and slide rulers. Even the finishing touches for plane parts were often done manually, with a metal file, sand paper and some polish paste.

Production line

The story goes that there was even a joke: American R&D scientists were scheming against the Soviet manufacturing, until the CIA cracked a spy. The spy said:

— Do you know what you need to do to kill the Soviet manufacturing?

— What?

— Nothing!

And indeed, those factories were only good for their times of Cold Wars, when the resources were unlimited but nobody would demand a cost-benefit analysis or even a ROI report. Not anymore, so rest in peace, “Made in the USSR”.

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Think Big? No, Even Bigger!

eugenia — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 23:18:04 +0000

“New Moscow”, by Tschusev and Zholtovsky, was developed in 1917–1924.

We have come across a few private scans of a book “New Moscow” published in 1982. Just after the Revolution of 1917 the new government officials were very keen to change everything around — even more so, they wanted to raze the existing system to the ground and build a new one. So the architects were busy thinking big — and bigger — for the new Soviet country.

This wooden Lenin’s Mausoleum was built in 1924 and was to presuppose the current one, built in 1929. The architectural historians place a huge significance on this particular building, arguing that this turned the Red Square into the celebratory-memorial place (as opposed to the market place, as it was before).

Lenin’s Mausoleum, 1924. Architect A. Tschusev.

One of the biggest problems of those times was accommodation — there was an acute need to smooth out the gap between the rich and the poor, which the pre-Revolution Moscow was so prone to. In 1918 the first step was to shift the workers from the horrible barracks from the outer areas into the bourgeoisie’s flats in central Moscow. This was an action more symbolic rather it was practical as it did not help much: it only geographically distanced the workers from their factories and increased the density of the inner city.

So the “new era” accommodation was required, and this was the initial plan. Sadly, planning often failed as shortly afterward it was discovered that apartment blocks are cheaper to build and easier to maintain than the individual houses.

Sokol village, 1923–1935. Architect N.Morkovnikov.

So the apartment blocks of the new generation were meant to contain everything for the new Soviet people: initially planned as mini-cities, they were designed to have all necessary facilities for everyday activities (gyms, shops, cafes etc). This building below seemed to be slightly ahead of its times: it was simply too big, and the tiny Moskva-river seemed too shallow of a creek next to it. Fortunately, as the city continued to grow, such apartment buildings grew to be fit the city’s layout in a more harmonious way.

Apartment block on the Bersen Embankment. 1928–1930, Architect M. Iophan.

If you remember our old post “How Khrushchev had Killed the Vamprire” , we covered this architectural style there in more details.

Apartment building of 1934. Architect I. Zholtovsky.

1940. Atchitects A.Burov, B. Blokhin. One of the first apartment buildings built out of whole conctrere blocks

Below are some buildings designed for work and leisure.

Workers’ Leisure Club. 1927–1929. Architect K. Melnikov.

The publishing house “Izvestia” (“News”). 1925–1927, architect G. Bakhtin.One of the first Soviet business centres.

Project of the Palace of Soviets. 1938. Architects — B. Iophan, V. Tschukho, V. Gelfreich. Sadly it was never built due to the lack of financing.

More about this building here: How Khrushchev Had Killed the Vampire.

The lenin’s State Library. 1928–1941, Architects V. Tschuko, V. Gelfreich.

The Crimean Bridge. 1936–1938. Architect A. Vlasov, Chief Engineer B. Konstantinov.

Project of the Red Army Theater and Entertaining Centre. 1934–1940. Architects L. Alabyan & V. Simbirtsev.

One of the most epic buildings of that era: Moscow State Universty. 1949–1954, designed by a group of architects.

These monumental beauties would have belonged to the last “big” lot. Shortly afterwards the architects were told to downsize, to design affordable simplistic buildings for mass production. The war had certainly played its part, but it was just a sign of those times — grand, hopeful for the best, and monumental.

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A Trip Around the USSR: Leningrad 1972

eugenia — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 12:53:25 +0000

The Griboedov Channel. The bridges St Petersburg is so famous for.

By many, St Petersburg (Leningrad in 1924–1991) is often considered to be so beautiful due to its architecture of Italian origin. Quite strange to see these fine buildings embellished by the symbols of the Soviet Era. Let’s take a walk around this fine city in the summer almost 30 years ago.

When I was 7 years old, there was a flower market just like that next to our house. By Erhard K.

Image by Erhard K.

Peterhof, the Russian Versailles, by Erhard K.

Peterhof by Erhard K.

The Smolny Cathedral, by Erhard K.

The Neva River embankment, Rostral Pillars. Image by Erhard K.

The Dvortsovaya Embankment. Image by Erhard K.

Summer river cruises. By Erhard K.

St Isaac’s Cathedral, the monument of Peter the Great. By Erhard K.

The Winter Palace close up, Dvortsovaya Embankment. By Erhard K.

The Winter Palace, from the Palace Bridge, by Erhard K.

Peter the Great was the one to build this city on the swamps. During the Khruschev Era, the city was further decorated.

Nevsky Avenue, by Erhard K.

The Neva embankment, the Aurora cruiser, by Erhard K.

In 1925, the Aurora cruise ship played a major part in the October Revolution: the city was flaming with revolutionary spirit and so the Revolutionary Committee was created. On 25 October 1917, Aurora refused to carry an order to take off to sea, which sparked the Revolution. At 9.45 p.m. on that date, a blank shot from her forecastle gun signalled the start of the assault on the Winter Palace.

The Church of the Saviour on Blood (Spas na Krovi), by Erhard K.

The main street: Nevsky Prospect (Avenue). By Erhard K.

The Dvortsovaya Square, Aleksandriysky Stolp, by Erhard K.

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Wrap Your Baby in Old Newspapers — the 70 Years of Deficit of Everything.

eugenia — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 23:23:42 +0000

A typical Soviet shop with bare shelves.

One of the main critisisms of the Soviet Union now, from an every day perspective, was the huge deficit of everything. The planned economy failed to supply a constant flow of goods necessary for the well being of people. It was not the matter of incapacity — no, the means certainly allowed to build space shuttles or create extra strong tanks. The shortage for goods was created artificially — due to the reasons of the strange Soviet ideology.

A shop in Vladivostok, The sign on the wall: Juices. Water. Ice Cream. The photo is by Vladimir Kobzar.

According to the Soviet census of 1977 — cited from the Grand Soviet Encyclopaedia — volume 24, part 2, data on the house hold items of prolonged usage (that is, TV sets, fridges, washing machines) - the times of Brezhnev were far from abundant. For instance, in 1975 only 74 out of 100 households owned a TV — which means that 26% of all families would not have one! Furthermore, these TVs would have to be black and white, as colour TVs did not widely appear in the USSR until very late eighties. In the mid 1970s an average American family had a 1.5 TV sets per house — and they were certainly colour.

Come here, honey, Brezhnev is on now!

In the mid to late 1980s the situation with TVs had straightened out — but doesn’t it seem ridiculous that in 1975, the year of Soyuz Apollo space docking project, every fourth family in the USSR did not have a telly! Now it seems like the government had to make a choice — either every house gets a TV — or we explore outer space. The success of the Americans in both of these missions was frowned upon.

It’s very hard to gauge what was kind of a shop it was!

It could be understood if this applied to some high tech for those times gadgets — but no, this was the every day necessities. Say, the very first range of video cassete players and recorders was released by Sony in 1969. If we were to say that an average Russian person did not even hear about the VCRs till late 1980s — we would not be exhagerrating. Moreover, a regular household was only able to purchase one in the early 1990s. But this applied to almost everything, from fridges to radio transmitters — only 61% of families owed a fridge in 1975. How is that possible that the space exploration programmes were costing the country a formidable chunk of the budget — yet very little money was spent on supplying regular people with the necessities? The data on washing machines is similar: about 40% of all households had to do their washing by hand.

The same was with almost all household goods — the notorious example here is baby nappies. The disposable nappies were invented in 1958, and three years later they became a necessety for every baby born in the West. If you were born around that time and you are reading this here now, you would be very likely to think the situation was no different all over the world, exept perhaps some Africa bits. Alas — the USSR saw no nappies - not till very late 80s, and when they appereared, they cost a small fortune. To wrap babies in old newspapers was not unheard of.

This nappy phenomenon was idisyncratic for the USSR, and no logical explanation has ever been offered. Moreover, the goods of prolonged usage had really proved to be of this kind: as no replacement was available, TVs and fridges were in use for decades, often despite the technological progress. Also, to buy a fridge or a TV one had to fill a request which could take months to come through.

The siege of a wine shop. 1990.

This total deficit of everything created an agitated demand for things on the black market. As shops were barely filled, the savings of an average person mounted, and much of it would have been disposable. Of course, a TV cost three or four average monthly salaries, but often there was nothing to spend the money on — at all.

One item check out

The was and its aftertaste was long gone, yet the Soviet life was not in the hurry to improve and to catch up with the American lifestyle. The Soviet dream was meant to be in full throttle, according to the movies and other means of propaganda. Yet the huge gap between the reality and the official version was one of the most debilitating features of life back in the Soviet Union.

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Сollective Housing

Dmitry Yakimenko — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 13:09:55 +0000

The Soviet Union comprised one-sixth of the earth’s land surface which made the one-family detached houses possible to build, unlike in the countries with the lack of land territories. However, the overall rundown of the country after the WWII had forced the government to commence the mass construction of collective flat blocks in order to accommodate hoards of people who had no roof over their heads.

New buildings with small private apartments replaced miserable wooden cottages where people lived in awful conditions without showers or indoor toilets.

1964. Building of apartment house

Since early 1920-s, while the ordinary people lived in the poky wooden huts or nestled together in the shared collective apartments, the ruling elite tenanted in the state-of-the-art houses.

House for the Soviet elite

Because of the mass construction of the apartment blocks by the middle of 1970-s all Soviet cities looked very similar to each other.

1975. Typical Soviet suburb

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