In 1903, a prominent public figure, founder and publisher of the Constitutional Democrats' newspaper "Rech," the Jew Yulian Bak, purchased land with a dilapidated house built by the Haugers in 1844. He commissioned the construction to architect Boris Girshovich, who had previously designed a number of houses for well-known Jewish figures, such as bank buildings on Nevsky Prospect and income houses throughout Petersburg. Additionally, he participated in the development of the project for the Great Choral Synagogue (Lermontovsky Prospect, 2). Girshovich was tasked with building a modern, high-tech fashionable house for wealthy Petersburg residents, influential state officials, and military personnel, and the construction was completed in 1905.

On the left is the owner of the house, Y.B. Bak; on the right is the architect B.I. Girshovich.

The result was a beautiful Art Nouveau house with Rococo elements. The most outstanding feature of Bak’s house is considered to be the unique suspended galleries. Girshovich wanted to introduce something unusual into his project—something that would make his creation stand out among other income houses in Petersburg. The architect decided to connect the buildings facing each other on the second and fifth floors with an open balcony and covered galleries. Such a courtyard is called suspended. Thanks to the galleries, one can move to the opposite part of the building without descending into the courtyard. This design allowed for increased rental of the courtyard buildings, as they became accessible from the main entrance. This architectural feature gives the typical Petersburg courtyard-well an original appearance, reminiscent of the psychedelic labyrinths of the Dutch graphic artist M.C. Escher’s house.

Girshovich maximized the use of the plot area and designed basements not only under the buildings but also under the undeveloped part of the courtyard. These housed storage for coal and firewood, as well as rented wine cellars. Contemporaries were impressed by the huge apartments of 10–15 rooms with mirrored windows and stucco ceilings, a marble staircase, and an Art Nouveau style elevator.

The Bak family lived in a seven-room apartment on the fifth floor. In 1908, Yulian Borisovich passed away at the age of 48. In 1909, during an inspection of the building for obtaining a loan secured by it, appraisers noted the good quality of construction. They were struck by the decoration of the apartments and the main staircase, the complete modern engineering systems, and the elevator. The apartments featured individual fireplaces and stoves, while central steam heating was also provided. Beautiful stained glass windows in the windows were made by masters of the Northern Glass Industry Society (the trading house "M. Frank & Co."). It is no wonder that from the very day of its construction, Bak’s house attracted the entire Petersburg beau monde like a magnet.

Because the Bak family went bankrupt and his widow had to sell the income house, records remain in the documents about those who rented apartments there in 1909. The house was home to the Minister of War, a commercial advisor, the chairman of the board of the Russian Cotton-Spinning Manufactory Society, a colonel, the head of the police department, the head of the prison system, and many others. Artist studios with skylights were located in the attic spaces. From 1906 to 1910, one of these studios was occupied by Léon Bakst. Here he created his famous works for the Diaghilev Seasons.

Under Soviet rule, the huge apartments with many rooms and rich interior decoration became communal apartments; out of 73 apartments, 21 were divided. The studios in the attics also turned into communal apartments, and most of the skylights lost their glazing and were boarded up with plywood or iron sheets.

One of the apartments in Bak’s house housed the salon of Sofya Isaakovna Chatskina. The publisher of the magazine "Northern Notes" introduced many young talents of the time to the public: Akhmatova and Tsvetaeva, Yesenin and Klyuev, Mandelstam and Khodasevich. In apartment No. 37, from about 1930 to 1941, lived the famous writer Anatoly Marienhof with his wife, BDT actress Anna Nikritina. Their guests often included composer Dmitri Shostakovich, ballerina Galina Ulanova, director Yuri Zavadsky, and actor Vasily Kachalov.

During the war, Bak’s house miraculously survived; once a bomb hit it, pierced several floors, but did not explode. A shell hit the facade and also did not explode.

Since then, a crack has run along the facade of the house, due to which some apartments sell poorly. In the "Kirochnaya 24" public group, it is written: "Our house is not just an architectural monument. It is like a person who has lived a whole century and has known the heights and joys, hopes and sorrows. This is a house that wants to live. This is a house with a human story. A gallery of stories."

Residents of one of the apartments recall that "when we were renovating one of the rooms, we removed eight layers of wallpaper, and the bottommost layer was newspapers from 1905 in German."

"One of the rooms was paneled with oak, apparently it was once an office. All rooms had so-called mirrored windows with double frames and rubber gaskets for insulation. Each room had its own unique stucco ceiling pattern," others recall.

By the end of the Soviet era, Bak’s house stood without any repairs. In 1991, there were plans to renovate the building according to Soviet principles, which meant removing all fireplaces, stained glass, and destroying stucco and decor. By that time, marble staircases and windowsills, as well as elegant stucco decoration, had been preserved in the entrances. Bak’s house began to frequently appear in films and TV series, attracting city residents and tourists.

In the 2010s, a guard booth appeared at the main entrance, and the marble floors in the entrance hall began to be cleaned daily. Residents were only happy about the absence of homeless people and the lit light bulbs. In 2013, after a raid on Bak’s house by OMON (special police), it turned out that an illegal casino was operating on the second floor. Its closure led to another decline in the house and the settlement of new homeless people. This led to the unification of the residents and the creation of a public group to solve everyday problems.

At the end of September 1999, a "secret room" was found in the house. It is accessed through a hatch in the wall of a room above the arch—previously occupied by housing maintenance staff. In the "secret room," documents from 100 years ago, pre-revolutionary newspapers, and an "essay on boredom" typed on a typewriter were discovered.

Sources:

https://kudago.com/spb/news/dohodnyij-dom-baka-udivitelnaya/–

https://paperpaper.ru/kak-v-dome-baka-obnaruzhili-tajnuyu-kom/

https://saint-petersburg.ru/m/history/rubin/371416/

https://fondvnimanie.ru/news/247/istoriya-doma-baka