The building of the Russian Bank for Foreign Trade at 32 Khreshchatyk Street is an architectural monument. This rare structure in Kyiv’s urban landscape is designed in the "Northern Modern" style. This elegant four-story building is part of a complex of few imperial-era structures that survived on Khreshchatyk during World War II. Architecture experts sometimes call the building "Italian." This is due to its decoration—the building’s ornaments slightly resemble Palazzo Strozzi, a masterpiece of Renaissance architecture located in Kyiv’s twin city, Florence. The author of this Kyiv masterpiece is the St. Petersburg architect Fyodor Lidval, and the sculptural decoration of the facade was done by sculptor Vasily Kuznetsov.
The estate, on which the bank was eventually located, belonged from the late 1860s to the future General Nechaev. He developed it over ten years: gradually erecting a stone front house and wings. In the early 1880s, the owner repeatedly applied to the city administration requesting to rebuild the main house to accommodate shops and also sought permission to build a chapel nearby. Shops appeared on the first floor, but the chapel was not allowed to be built.
In 1908, the Russian Bank for Foreign Trade (founded in 1871, with its board in St. Petersburg) purchased the plot for its Kyiv branch. Its new premises were built according to the project and under the supervision of the St. Petersburg academician of Swedish origin, architect Fyodor Lidval, with finishing works carried out by St. Petersburg artist-sculptor Kuznetsov. Between 1911 and 1913, a beautiful building was erected on the site of the old three-story house. The volumetric-spatial structure of the symmetrical, T-shaped plan building was dictated by functional needs and consisted of three parts: a five-story representative front building on a vaulted basement, a tall one-and-a-half-story operations hall (now a three-story building with a glass lantern), and a five-story service building at the end of the plot. All three volumes were connected to each other. The expressive front facade is based on reworked forms of Italian (Florentine) Renaissance in a modernized interpretation. The facade’s distinctive feature is the cladding of the entire surface of the four floors with rusticated Swedish granite, gray with pink veins. Maskarons are placed in the keystones of the shop windows and gates; the portal of the main entrance is framed with stylized garlands and topped with a large cartouche, which previously bore the bank’s name in applied letters. Slightly smaller vertical compositions are developed in the piers of the second to fourth floors—with vases, medallions, garlands, festoons, allegorical figures, and profiles. The fifth floor opens with windows facing the courtyard, and the facade part has mansard windows hidden behind a high parapet-balustrade. The composition is completed by another cartouche along which sturdy figures lie semi-reclined, holding "horns of plenty." They symbolize trade and navigation.
The successfully found scale of the building, the imaginative facade design, and the high quality of the architectural and sculptural detailing place the house among the best examples of pre-revolutionary development of the city’s main artery—Khreshchatyk.
The building was the third banking structure on Khreshchatyk. The increase in banks was caused by the growth of capital turnover primarily based on sugar sales and the overall economic boom in the most economically developed part of the Russian Empire—Ukraine. As of 1914, Kyiv had 15 bank branches, 18 mutual credit societies, credit cash offices, loan and savings associations, and nine banking offices. By the end of 1917, Kyiv already had 35 banks and their branches. Here, in the Russian Bank for Foreign Trade and the St. Petersburg International Commercial Banks, 90 percent of operations for the export of Ukrainian sugar were concentrated. Kyiv at that time had the unofficial status of the "sugar capital" of the Russian Empire. However, since the bank’s construction was completed just before the start of World War I, its appearance soon lost relevance. The building was the third banking structure on Khreshchatyk. The increase in banks was caused by the growth of capital turnover primarily based on sugar sales and the overall economic boom in the most economically developed part of the Russian Empire—Ukraine. As of 1914, Kyiv had 15 bank branches, 18 mutual credit societies, credit cash offices, loan and savings associations, and nine banking offices. By the end of 1917, Kyiv already had 35 banks and their branches. Here, in the Russian Bank for Foreign Trade and the St. Petersburg International Commercial Banks, 90 percent of operations for the export of Ukrainian sugar were concentrated.
The building is unique primarily due to the facade decoration. The well-known art historian Georgy Lukomsky, one of the first to use the term "Italian house" in relation to it, noted that it has no analogues in Kyiv. As is customary for such establishments, the bank’s facade is adorned with elements inspired by ancient history. Huge amphorae are depicted here; on the lintels of the first-floor windows—maskarons; above the main entrance is a cartouche, on both sides of which sculptures symbolizing trade and shipping are placed. The facade cladding was done with rusticated Finnish granite.
Unfortunately, during World War II, some elements were lost. Still, it is worth noting that the modest Kyiv copy of the Italian Palazzo was very fortunate. It is one of the few pre-revolutionary houses that survived the explosions and fire on Khreshchatyk in September 1941. The terrible events are still reminded by the melted maskarons on the facade of this "lucky one."
The building’s original "financial" purpose remained almost unchanged until World War II. After the establishment of Soviet power, the bank was nationalized. In the 1920s, the Kyiv City District Financial Department operated in the building, and from 1934 it was occupied by the People’s Commissariat of Finance of the Ukrainian SSR, the republican office of Gosstrakh, and regional and city financial departments.
On September 24, 1941, five days after the entry of the German 6th Army units into the capital, mines previously planted by the NKVD began to explode. The neighboring cornerstone houses on Khreshchatyk, 28/2 and 30/1, were blown up. The bank also caught fire. As a result of the fire, the granite cladding of the lintels and maskarons, decorations in the window sills, and the like were lost. Only the cartouche above the main door and the maskaron above the gate remained intact.
In 1950, the building was restored, and the operations hall was rebuilt into a three-story service building with a glass lantern above the central part of the top floor. Here were located institutions of the Kyiv City Council—the Office of the Chief Architect of the city and the design institute "Kyivproekt." The first-floor premises also served as shops. The elongated plot of development limited the facade size to five window axes, and the house’s layout, according to its functional purpose, also extended into the depth of the estate.
Since the late 1940s, the building has housed the institution of the Kyiv City Council—the Office of the Chief Architect of the city. The board of the design institute "Kyivproekt" was also located here, where outstanding builders worked, including Anatoly Dobrovolsky, under whose leadership the restoration of Khreshchatyk took place.
Today, the building houses the Department of Urban Planning and Architecture of the Kyiv City State Administration. The first floor is occupied by private commercial establishments; for a long time, there was a souvenir shop popular with city visitors.
Sources:
https://kyivpastfuture.com.ua/en/italian-house-on-khreshchatyk-history/
https://kiev-foto.info/en/houses/1907-kreshchatik-32-building-of-the-russian-bank-for-foreign-trade-1913-15
