Public Office Building
Public Office refers to work with population performed by state employees. The building for public work with all citizens, regardless of their requests, was constructed in 1781. This was when the government funded the construction of the stone building for the province administration office, which would be worthy to become a public office location for the Center of the Volga Region. The construction of the public office building was completed two years later.
In the Russian Empire, the term “public office” stood for the state agency, designed to work with the population. The building housed reception offices, and the governor with his family also lived there. To get inside, you had to walk up the main staircase to the second floor, where the central, "throne" hall with choir stalls for musicians was located. Such oddities in the layout were due to the fact that the Governor's Palace was built in anticipation of a possible visit by the Emperor. Sometimes, the visits indeed occurred: in 1798, a ball in honor of Paul I with the participation of Tatar merchants and the Mufti took place in the residence of the governor. After the fire of 1815, architect Schmidt expanded and consolidated the existing buildings. A note of special elegance was added to the building thanks to patterned trims, decorative panels and roof balustrade. Restoration of the office started in 1999 and was completed in 2005. Today, the office building plays a role just as important as hundreds of years ago. The building houses the Administration of the Kazan Kremlin State Historical and Architectural Art Museum-Reserve, Arbitration Court of the Republic of Tatarstan, and other state institutions. The public office building is connected to the building of the former Consistory. The Consistory, or a subsidiary body of the Diocesan Administration under the Bishop, was rebuilt in the 18th century on the basis of the 16th century Bishop’s livery yard, and the facades were reconstructed in the 19th century. Here divorce proceedings and Church excommunications took place (this is exactly what happened to Alesha Peshkov, future Maxim Gorky). In Soviet times, the Consistory housed the Ministry of Health of Tatarstan, and now - the History Institute of Shigabutdin Mardzhani of the Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Tatarstan. The 202-meter-long facade of the building had the traits of "Petersburg" Baroque, but in the 19th century, it became a model of the sustained late classicism. The purpose of the building affected its architecture as a matter of course - it has the inherent dignity, strictness and laconicism of forms, which makes it similar to the complex of Kazan University or the Guest House. |
Qualities
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