Bolshoy Dom

Categories / Architecture/Architectural Monuments/Public Buildings and Edifices
Categories / Social Life/Political Repressions
BOLSHOY DOM (Big House)(4 Liteiny Avenue), the name Leningraders gave to the administrative building where the bodies of Joint State Political Administration Board (OGPU), People's Commissariat of Home Affairs, the Ministry of State Security (NKVD) and State Security Committee (KGB) were housed. Bolshoy Dom was built on the initiative of S.M. Kirov in 1931-32 (architect N.A. Trotsky, A.I. Gegello, A.A. Ol with the assistance of N.E. Lansere, L.P. Shishko, I.F. Bezpalova, Y.V. Shchuko, et al.), replacing the building of a District Court, which burnt down during the February Revolution of 1917. Like the District Court, the Bolshoy Dom is connected by a passage to the former House of Preliminary Detention, which today functions as a pre-trial detention centre. The architecture of the Bolshoy Dom reflects the new tendencies of Soviet architecture: a retreat from Constructivism toward the monumental Classicism. Pillars, high corner towers, and mighty lower floor faced with granite and the strictness of shapes are typical of the style. Since the mid 1930s the name Bolshoy Dom has become a sort of euphemism for the Leningraders, similar to Moscow's Lubyanka. Today the building houses the Department of Federal Security Service (FSB) for St. Petersburg and Leningrad Region.

V. G. Isachenko. Bezpalov Innokenty Fedorovich
Gegello Alexander Ivanovich
Kirov (real name Kostrikov) Sergey Mironovich
Lansere Nikolay Evgenievich
Ol Andrey Andreevich
Shchuko Yury Vladimirovich
Shishko Lev Petrovich
Trotsky Noy Abramovich
Liteiny Ave/Saint Petersburg, city, house 4
February Revolution of 1917
District Court
House of Preliminary Detention, prison
Bolshoy Dom
1932