Dormitories

Categories / City Services/Housing and Communal Services
DORMITORIES. A living-quarters system for a large number of people living together, present in St. Petersburg from the first days of the city’s existence. The first builders of the city lived, as a rule, in large groups, usually in way stations or in basements of buildings under construction. Barracks, quarters and educational institutions were arranged in the form of dormitories. In the second part of the 19th century, charitable associations, promoting the introduction of cheap living quarters for workers, emerged in St. Petersburg. Construction of a residential complex at the corner of the Second Company of the Izmailovsky Regiment and Tarasova Lane, intended to house poor people in dormitories meeting "all the latest sanitary requirements", was commissioned by the Society for Affordable Housing and Other Benefits for the Needy, founded by a group headed by M.V. Trubnikova, A.P. Filosofova, N.V. Stasova and others. In 1877, the Aid to Poor Society, from the Preobrazhensky Guards Cathedral parish (4 Artilleriiskaya Street), commissioned a three-story stone house using donations and a loan from the St. Petersburg Credit Association. It included an orphanage, free apartments, and a dormitory for women (up to 40 beds in 4 rooms). Its roomers got a free bed, holiday gifts, medical care, medicine and bath cards. Those who settled there mainly included widows of officials and soldiers' wives. Next door, at 3 Kirochnaya Street, Apartment 15, was an orphanage run by the Saint Xenia Society for Young Working Women. As a rule, dormitories were located in the immediate proximity or on the territory of institutions and educational establishments, where lodgers worked or studied. A dormitory was built for St. Petersburg University students at 3 Filologichesky Lane (1880-82, architect L.N. Benois, R.A. Gedike), the so-called Alexander College. After October 1917, dormitories formed an integral part of city housing. Some families lived in dormitories connected with plants, factories and other enterprises, staying there for several decades without being able to buy their own flats. From the 1930s, the number of dormitories constantly increased due to a wave of labour entering the city from villages and other towns. In 1976-2002, some 586 dormitories were abolished; their legal status was changed and 432 dormitories were transformed into apartment houses. By 1 January 2002, St. Petersburg numbered 1023 dormitories with a total area of 4,291,000 square meters. A total of 220 dormitories are registered as federal property, and are used to house students and officials from specialised secondary and higher educational establishments; 61 dormitories are under the charge of Ministry of Defence's military units, establishments and enterprises.

References: О значении дешевых квартир в общественной благотворительности. СПб., 1883; Отчет Квартирной комиссии 17-го Городского попечительства о бедных в Петрограде за время с 10 авг. 1914 г. по 1 авг. 1915 г. Пг., 1915; Лебина Н. Б. Трущобы эпохи социализма // С.-Петерб. панорама. 1992. № 8. С. 15-16.

E. P. Bogoslovskaya. Benois Leonty Nikolaevich
Filosofova Anna Pavlovna
Gedike Robert Andreevich
Stasova Nadezhda Vasilievna
Trubnikova Maria Vasilievna
Artilleriiskaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 4
Filologichesky Lane/Saint Petersburg, city, house 3
Kirochnaya St./Saint Petersburg, city, house 3, litera кв. 15
Лебина Н. Б. Трущобы эпохи социализма // С.-Петерб. панорама, 1992
Отчет Квартирной комиссии 17-го Городского попечительства о бедных в Петрограде за время с 10 авг. 1914 г. по 1 авг. 1915 г. Пг.
О значении дешевых квартир в общественной благотворительности. СПб., 1883 State University, St. Petersburg