Redevelopment is a process that is widespread throughout Russia, and Kazan is no exception. Kazan is developing rapidly and is raising a new generation of young, creative, and highly promising architects for the country. This is why Innopolis, Russia’s youngest and most high-tech city and a satellite of Kazan, will be hosting the Second Russian Architecture Biennale for Young Architects from October 24th to 26th, 2019. The aim of the biennale is to support young architects and draw them into the field of urban development. The concept devised by architect Sergei Tchoban, the biennale’s curator, involves giving young specialists a chance to carry out unique, contemporary projects all over Russia and to establish working relationships with local governments.
This year, 739 applicants from six countries and 53 cities have submitted projects; this is almost twice as many as for the first biennale. Architects and urban planners under the age of 35 sent in applications from Moscow, St Petersburg, Kazan, London, Miami, Delhi, Beijing, and Pisa. From these applications, 30 finalists have been chosen.
“This year, we made the terms more difficult for applicants,” says Nataliya Fishman-Bekmambetova, the biennale’s director. “We didn’t ask them to invent a project. We asked them to come up with ideas for the redevelopment of actual industrial sites in Kazan. I think there will be lots of interesting projects, since we have many good specialists — we just need to give them a chance to work.”
