using the example of a parish church from the 18th – 19th centuries
The facade is a photomontage of individual photographs taken from distant points with a minimal angle and arranged into a single drawing. The façade and plan are given on the same scale; there is a line of sizes on the plan, which makes it possible to imagine the real dimensions of the building and its details.
A completely traditional parish temple of the 18th – 19th centuries was chosen for development - the Church of Sergius in Rogozhskaya Sloboda, in which you can find details of several stages in the development of Russian architecture.
The building is a three-part composition - a bell tower, a refectory, a temple with an apse - consisting of buildings from different periods. The oldest part is the refectory with porticoes on the facades, a structure from the era of mature Moscow classicism (late 18th century). The temple is made in the late Empire style, cubic, massive and solemn (first half of the 19th century). Bell tower - in pseudo-classical forms (1864).
The plan shows the structure of the building with a clear “west-east” axis, uniting the buildings into a single complex.
There are 60 terms identified on the facade and plan, and it is possible that this list will be supplemented.
It should be noted that this work is only a kind of “visual aid” for and in no way pretends to be an examination of the building itself.
Literature:
- Architectural monuments of Moscow. Volume 6. – M.: Art, 2000.
- History of Russian architecture. – M.: Academy of Architecture of the USSR, Institute of History and Theory of Architecture, 1956.
- Pluzhnikov V.I. Terms of Russian architectural heritage. – M.: Art, 1995.
Facade of the Church of San Lorenzo (1516-1520)
"... for at that time the death of Pope Julius happened, and therefore this work was abandoned due to the election of Pope Leo X, who, shining with enterprise and power no less than Julius, wished to remain in his homeland, for he was the first high priest, from there came, in memory of himself and the divine artist, his fellow citizen, such miracles that could only have been created by such a great sovereign as he.
And therefore, since he ordered that the facade of San Lorenzo in Florence, the church built by the Medici family, be entrusted to Michelangelo, this circumstance was the reason that the work on the tomb of Julius remained unfinished. Michelangelo was ordered to express his opinion, draw up a project and lead the new work. Michelangelo opposed this with all his might, citing the obligations regarding the tomb that he had entered into with the Cardinal of the Four Saints and Aginense. The Pope answered him not to think about it, that he had already thought for him and freed him from his obligations to them, promising to allow Michelangelo to work on the figures for the said tomb in Florence in the spirit in which he had already begun them; but all this upset both the cardinals and Michelangelo, who retired in tears.
It is not for nothing that subsequent discussions of all this were varied and countless, especially since they wanted to divide the work on the facade between several persons; many architects came to Rome to visit the pope, and the designs were drawn up by Baccio d'Agnolo, Antonio da Sangallo, Andrea and Jacopo Sansovino, as well as the lovely Raphael of Urbino, who for this purpose was sent to Florence later, when the pope arrived there. Therefore, Michelangelo also decided make a model, expressing a desire that only he, and no one else, be the main leader of the architectural work. However, this refusal to help was the reason that neither he nor the others started work, and, giving up on everything, the named masters returned to their usual occupations, and Michelangelo, having gathered in Carrara, received an order that Jacopo Salviati pay him a thousand crowns; however, since Jacopo was sitting locked in his room, discussing business with some townspeople, Michelangelo did not want to wait for the reception, but , without saying a word, he turned and immediately left for Carrara...
Michelangelo spent many years quarrying marble; True, while getting it, he sculpted wax models and did some other things to fulfill the order, but the matter became so difficult that the money intended by the pope for this work was spent on the war in Lombardy, and the whole work remained unfinished by the death of Leo; after all, nothing else was done except the front part of the foundation, under the facade, and a large marble column was brought from Carrara to Piazza San Lorenzo" Vasari.
Significant obstacle to completion tomb of Pope Julius II Michelangelo was a new order from Pope Leo X. If Julius II took Michelangelo away from sculpture and ordered him to paint, the new pope ordered him to become an architect and finish the facade of the Church of San Lorenzo in Florence, where his father, grandfather, great-grandfather and many other representatives of the house were buried Medici. In vain Michelangelo refused, citing his obligations to the heirs of Pope Julius, and the fact that architecture is "not his specialty", - he had to obey.
The new Pope Leo X decided to complete the facade of the Church of San Lorenzo - the Medici Church in Florence - during his stay in Florence in 1515. Initially, many architects and sculptors were involved in the development of the project (Antonio Sangallo, Andrea and Jacopo Sansovino, Raphael, Baccio d" Agnolo), Michelangelo alone received the order for the second time on January 19, 1518. Drawings of his designs are preserved in the Uffizi and in the Casa Buonarroti, where a wooden model of the facade is also kept.
Leo X wanted 10 statues to be placed on the facade: four below, four above them and two even higher. The lower statues should depict Saints Lawrence, John the Baptist, Peter and Paul, above them the four evangelists (Luke, John, Matthew and Mark), and at the very top the home saints of the customer’s family - Cosmas and Damian.
To make mosaic icons, as a rule, smalt is used - colored opaque glass in the form of cubes or plates, but you can also take multi-colored squares of stone. Each material has its own characteristics. The stone is not transparent and does not glow from the inside like smalt. Smalt has a number of undeniable advantages: this coating is very frost-resistant and heat-resistant, so glass mosaic can be used on facades. Thanks to the wide selection of colors from smalt, you can create any mosaic composition. Today, for the manufacture of mosaics, they most often use not pure smalt (since it is very expensive), but its combination with glass with the addition of aventurine and glass with gold leaf.
In modern practice, they use the technology of setting mosaic compositions in art workshops on a base made of a polymer mesh using adhesive compositions such as the cement-polymer composition “kerabond” with the addition of “isolastic” dispersion, which increases the plasticity of the glue. Finished mosaic compositions are glued to prepared surfaces with adhesives.
The basis for the Roman mosaic is calcareous soil, consisting of slaked lime (1 part), fine quartz sand (2 parts), dry pigment (up to 20% of the mass of sand).
The basis of the Florentine mosaic, consisting of plates of polished marble selected according to the pattern, are asbestos-cement slabs, to which they are glued with glue.
Painting works
Before painting the facades, all window drains, trims, sandriks and other protruding architectural details, the installation of gutters and roof overhangs has been completed.
Materials for painting facades must be durable. Of the modern paint and varnish materials used for this purpose are limestone, organosilicate (VN-30 OSM-5), organosilicon (KO-174) enamels, perchlorovinyl facade paints (ХВ 161), facade paints based on chlorosulfonated polyethylene (ХП-71Ф), emulsion casein paints. Water-dispersion paints are not recommended due to their low weather resistance. Alkyd-acrylic paints with organic pigments should also not be used, since the pigments quickly burn out, and the coatings attract dust and quickly become dirty.
It is traditional to paint brick and plastered facades of temple buildings with lime paints based on low-magnesium lime with the addition of inorganic pigments or silicates. Coatings based on lime paints are decorative and have bright colors. The use of magnesium and dolomite lime significantly reduces the service life of such coatings. To extend their service life, paraffin, potassium alum, water-repellent agents are added to paints, or additional surface treatment is carried out with water-repellent agents. Hydrophobization of facades painted with lime paints is carried out using sodium alkyl siliconates (GKZh-10, GKZh-11), polyethylhydridesiloxane (GKZh-94), silazanes (174-71 former K 15/3).
Painting is carried out on brick or a durable plaster layer after completion of facade work. If there are defects after cleaning, the surface of the plaster is rubbed with lime (lime paste) mixed with fine washed sand in a ratio of 1:1.2. The primer for lime paints is a lime soap maker with the following composition, kg: boiling lime 1.2 - 2.0, drying oil, laundry soap 0.15 - 0.2, water no more than 0.025 - 0.310 l.
To increase adhesion, 35 - 40 g/l of casein can be added to lime paints containing large amounts of pigments.
When painting facades with perchlorovinyl paints, the surfaces, if necessary, are puttied with perchlorovinyl putty and primed with 5% perchlorovinyl varnish.
When painting internal surfaces with polyvinyl acetate compounds, the surfaces should be prepared in the same way as for oil painting, with mandatory priming before painting with a polyvinyl acetate primer.
The silicate multi-stage painting system "Kaim-Farben" (Germany) is intended for external and internal work. A wide palette of deep velvety colors makes it possible to perform monumental paintings on the facades and interiors of temples, reminiscent of ancient frescoes. Painting can be carried out on cement plaster, monolithic concrete base and natural stone. As a painting system, painting can be carried out using “Kaimovsky” plasters, primers and putties, which ensure high quality and durability.
Alfrey surface finishes are usually produced using high-quality paint coatings. Finishing of surfaces with painting of individual areas - panels, friezes, borders, etc. - in different colors is made so that the joint lines of the painted areas are decorated with panels or baguettes with an appropriately selected color tone, combining areas with different color tones into one harmonious whole.
A lot has been written about the Hosios Loukas monastery, but few people pay attention to the rich decor of the facades of its churches. In addition to traditional brick patterns, marble slabs with relief are widely used here, very similar to the pluteo of the altar barriers. True, most of them are suspiciously new and white, but there is no doubt that they were copied from exactly the same prototypes.
For myself, I divided the local decor into three groups - brick patterns, window sashes and marble reliefs.
On the southern facade you can see all these decorative techniques at once. 
Western façade. It seems that I have never seen such huge windows in Byzantine churches. All the reliefs in the lower part of the windows are of a standard size and have the same design, which means they are not spolia, but most likely made specifically for this temple. As for the design - another version - restorers found fragments of old slabs only with this design. :-)
Judging by the door in the center of the second floor facade, there was a balcony.
Rows of curbs and cloisonne masonry alternate with pseudo-Kufic inscriptions laid out from plinth.
Window grilles very elegant, decorated with braids and plant motifs. It’s difficult to say what they are made of. For stone ones, in my opinion, they are too thin; from a distance they look more like terracotta.
By the way, the color of the illuminated surfaces is slightly distorted by the evening sun.
In one of the churches in another place, you could see a closer look at such an old grating, and it looked very similar to stone.
On the archivolt windows there are figures of animals, reminiscent of Italian Romanesque, but more naturalistic.
Marble carved decorative elements- the most interesting part of the decor.
A piece of an authentic ancient slab.
Above it is an interesting pattern reminiscent of a Kufic inscription.
A relief similar to the previous one, but not the same.
The brackets and capitals are decorated with flourished crosses.
On the sides of the window there is a cornice with krin ornament.
Stained glass windows confuse me with their modernity.
Pluteos with similar ornaments are found very often in a variety of places. The central composition, however, is rarer.
Most of the slabs under the windows have this pattern.
The cathedral is raised above the square to a height of eight steps. The facade remained unfinished for a long time, as in many other Florentine churches. The stone wall of the facade was for many years similar to what we now see on the facade of the Church of St. Lawrence. In the 15th century, the noble Quaratesi family offered to finance the construction of the facade (the architect was supposed to be Simone del Pogliolo). However, the condition set by Quaratesi (the family coat of arms had to be in the center of the façade) turned out to be unacceptable for the Franciscan monks.
The appearance of the old unfinished facade comes to us from old engravings and paintings, as well as photographs from the 19th century. The church's façade remained unfinished for more than three centuries, showing a bare surface of Florentine limestone. In 1437 Saint Bernardino of Siena wanted to place above the rosette in a niche a rounded piece of stone representing the sun with rays containing the letters IHS (an abbreviation for the name of Jesus Christ). Apart from the coat of arms depicting Christ on the round carved window (placed in 1437 during the plague), the only decoration of the simple central portal was a gilded bronze statue of St. Louis of Toulouse by Donatello, in a niche in the center. This sculpture was moved from the tabernacle on the church of Orsanmichele, and was located above the central portal. Today it can be seen in the refectory of the monastery.
The current facade was created between 1853 and 1863 by the architect Niccolò Matas, whose work was inspired by the great Gothic cathedrals (most notably Siena Cathedral and Orvieto Cathedral), as well as the façade of the Florentine Duomo by Emilio de Fabris. The architect's work has long been criticized for its artificial neo-Gothic style. It is curious that the construction of the facade was financed by an English Protestant, and on the facade of the church there is a clearly non-Christian symbol - the Star of David. Inside the star there is a Christogram: the text of the inscription shows that the facade itself was supposed to be an extraordinary monument to the artist who created it. It is possible that this hexagon is a not-so-subtle allusion to the nationality and faith of the architect Matas.
Among the works of art that appeared on the facade, three lunettes of portals should be highlighted (a lunette is a field of wall in fine arts and architecture, limited by an arch and its supports in the shape of a semicircle or a segment of a circle and a horizontal line below, located above the doors or windows), decorated with bas-reliefs with depicting scenes about the life-giving Cross, to which the basilica is dedicated: on the left we see “The Installation of the Cross » Tito Sarrocci, "The Triumph of the Cross" » Sapienza and The Vision of Constantine » Emilio Zocchi.
In the central portal there are bronze doors, which until 1903 were located in the Duomo. In front of the portal is the grave of the architect Matas.
On the sides of the church in the lower tier are magnificent 14th-century arcades, in the upper tier there are tall double-leaf windows. The only decorations on the side of the basilica are gutters in the shape of human or lion heads. The fragile bell tower at the basilica dates back to 1847 - 1865, the architect was Gaetano Baccani. The height of the structure is more than 78 meters.
The neo-Gothic facade is decorated with multi-colored marble slabs arranged in a geometric pattern.
The marble used for the façade was of different types: white marble came from Seravezza, two types of red marble came from Cintoia and Bolgheri, light green came from Prato, dark from Pisa, black marble came from Asiano, yellow marble from Siena.