10 Marazlievskaya Street

The V. S. Kotlyarevsky’s house and outbuilding were created using the motifs of Renaissance and Baroque. They are an interesting example of eclectic architecture in Odessa at the end of the XIX century.

Type of building: mansion
Style: eclecticism, Renaissance
Architect: unknown
Date of construction: the end of the XIX century
Status: local architectural monument

Facades

The general view of the facades and a fence.

The Kotlyarevskys’ family was one of the richest representatives of merchants in Odessa that had been engaged in the manufactory trade since 1833. The business, founded by Pyotr Kotlyarevsky was inherited by one of his sons — Dmitriy Petrovich in 1870 who converted it into a wholesale firm. It became a partnership in 1898.

Manufactory trading was a very profitable business at those times. The famous Odessa merchant millionaire brothers Ptashnikov, Blizhensky, and of course, Kotlyarevsky made a fortune in this area. Dmitriy Petrovich died in 1900 and the business passed to his brother Pavel, who was one of the important members together with P. I. Kuchta at the trading firm.

The third brother — Ivan Petrovich, a doctor, was formally a partner there, but he didn’t participate in the business affairs. Later, I. P. Kotlyarevsky built his own house at 11 Kanatnaya Street, which was located at one of the ends of the Kotlyarevskys’ site. The other end of the site had an access to Marazlievskaya Street.

At the turn of 1880-90s, a representative of one of the family offshoots (probably from the side of the Pyotr Kotlyarevsky’s brother — Moisey), V. S. Kotlyarevsky erected two small mirror-like buildings on the side of Marazlievskaya Street, which are known as the Kotlyarevskys’ house and outbuilding. Afterwards, Kotlyarevsky sold the buildings separately, hence, the constructions are listed as Kochenkov and Karuso’s property in the landlords’ reference books “All Odessa” for 1902.

Photo of Marazlievskaya Street at the beginning of XX century. The Kotlyarevskys’ mansion is distinctively visible in the center of the shot.

The sides of both constructions have two windows that overlook the street. They are located along the edges of the site, which is separated from the street with a gorgeous forged fence. The buildings are quite modest in comparison to the surrounding houses, although, they have a number of esthetic advantages. The history hasn’t preserved the name of the project designer, however, the house and outbuilding are stylistically close to the works of D. E. Mazirov and U. M. Dmitrenko (which is also hard to identify). However, U. M. Dmitrenko started to apply large-scale and rich forms of Renaissance, used in the architecture of the Kotlyarevskys’ mansion, much later on.

Right-sided building

The buildings represent two austere parallelepipeds with the flat rear external corners, which planes have the service entrances. The main facade planes contain the front doors and four windows. They could be designated as the side of the building if it is viewed from the street.

Left-sided building

General view from the street. The building was expanded twice as much with the addition of extra floors.

The large windows of the main living quarters on the first floor are framed with elegant Renaissance casings and keystones.

Window casings of the first floor

Casings of a facade at the building line.

Decorative elements of the window casings.

The stucco moldings are absent on the facades. There is a variety of simple and plastic elements in the house decoration, many of which adhere to the strict laws of geometry. The houses are topped with massive cornices and broad friezes, which are added with the high attics from the side ends.

Attic fragment.

The windows of the basement (first floor) — small with segmental openings, preserved the original bars.

Basement windows with the authentic bars.

In the 2000s, the left-sided house was overbuilt with three (!) proper floors, which didn’t improve the building appearance. The original gate was a great example of the smithcraft of the second part of the XIX century, but was lost in Soviet times. It was recreated only in the second part of the 2000s.

Fence and gate

Housekeeping premises, situated in the depth of the vast site, haven’t survived. A part of it was probably demolished due to the construction of a small, three-storied house in the 1920s, which adjoins the end side of the Kotlyarevskys’ mansion.

References and archives

• “Architecture of Odessa. Style and time”. V. Pilyavsky
• “Buildings, constructions, monuments of Odessa and their Architects”. V. Pilyavsky
• “Along Marazlievskaya Street…”. Tatiana Zayarnay’s publication
• Old photos from the website of the Odessa photo gallery. User Brassl’s archive

Authors

• Aleksandr Levitsky, art director, photographer and colorist
• Dmitry Shamatazhi, photographer and complier
• Andrey Mikhailov, photographer
• Marina Tomenko, editor
• Marta Orlovska, translator