What are the new architects of 2017? Nikita Tokarev, the headmaster of the MARCH school, answers.

When opening the international School of Architecture and Urban Studies in Moscow in 2012, the creators of the MARCH wanted to grow "sensitive, thinking and responsible architects." Nikita Tokarev, the director of the MARCH, came to the Forum 100+. He spoke about the new generation of architects, their qualities and the result that the MARCH had achieved in the first five years of its work.

Architecture is a slow business. Unlike design or fashion, where results can appear quickly.

— Even in cinema, you can immediately make a TV series or a movie after receiving a diploma. Architecture doesn't work that fast, so we won't see any results in the form of buildings soon. There are results of activity — these are graduates. Our graduates work in leading architectural firms, not only in Moscow, but also abroad. Their success story is on the project's website. Some of them teach at school. We are very pleased that our graduates are joining us — thus the school gets a development perspective.

For an architect, working for a good architectural firm for several years is a good start. What will be their fate next? We will watch, help, and monitor. I think that the period for which their independent projects can appear is 3-5 years.

One of the important qualities of a modern architect is the ability to work in a team. Today's and tomorrow's architecture is more about working in an effective team than working alone. If you look at the front row of the world's architects, you'll see that there are more team names than names.

In small teams, the roles within are divided quite flexibly: one role in one project, another in another. Someone is good at generating ideas, someone in analytics, someone in communication, finding a common denominator — we try to tell students how to develop their strengths. It's great when such teams are formed in the process of studying — unfortunately, the traditional model of architectural education misses this aspect. Most of the projects are individual, and we see the upbringing of "lonely geniuses" who find it very difficult to rebuild.

We hope that the graduates of the MARCH are people of culture, thanks to them the architecture in Russia can get involved in culture, not just real estate or the economy. Architecture is now sidelined, it is not perceived as part of culture, and the attitude towards it today is rather utilitarian. For example, a theatrical premiere is more significant than the opening of a new building in the city. An architect would rather be invited to a real estate forum than to a conference to discuss cultural issues.

The turn of urban planning towards public spaces and landscaping slightly corrects the bias, these issues have become more often discussed in the press. Architectural and urban planning issues are being brought back into the field of public discussion. Not only "is the tile laid flat" or "how much did the new park cost", but also "what does it give citizens", "will it be attractive for citizens and tourists".

We try to instill an attitude towards architecture, first of all, as culture, and only then as technology and economics. Architecture is not only an artistic creation, it is the creation of an environment. That's how you should treat her.

The facts show that the majority of our graduates remain in Of Russia. We were very worried that our guys would fly to different countries after receiving their diploma. It was even kind of a shame for us to train architects here so that they could work somewhere far away. But statistics show that no more than 10-15% leave, and the rest remain working in Of Russia. This is also an important indicator for the MARCH — we are working for Russian architecture. Here, the market is more favorable, and finding a job in Germany, Italy, or even a free internship in London is much more difficult than in Of Russia.

So far, everything is simpler here, although the market is wild, the architect is poorly protected by law, especially with regard to architectural copyrights. In comparison with copyrights for music, literature, and cinema, where all aspects are prescribed and there is judicial practice (God forbid to sing someone else's song, show someone else's movie — they will immediately resort to a lawsuit), architecture is getting worse. It is very easy to distort someone else's project — the customer has almost unlimited rights to the project, and the status of the architect is not supported by anything and is not fixed by law. This weakens us — we see urban planning disasters and failures on the streets of cities and blame the architect, but not always the architect can influence the fate of his project. Today, the state does not see the value of architecture, and civil society is not strong enough to defend these values. Good architecture is an integral part of civil society. Society should have channels of influence on the place in which we live, and now these channels are blocked.

Consumers, residents, and users are most interested in the quality of architecture, but they do not have a voice, but the builder, developer, and official have a voice, and they decide what architecture should be.

So far, I do not see any movement towards solving this problem, although the fact that the topic of architecture and the urban environment has sounded in the public consciousness is a positive step.

Is there a concept of "Russian School of Architecture"?

— I don't believe in the possibility of a "national" architecture now. In the 19th century, we tried to create a modern image of Russian architecture from pseudo-historical elements, this approach has remained in the past.

At the same time, the national spirit of architecture probably exists. Looking at a modern project, we will be able to distinguish Spanish architecture from Finnish, but what these differences are is a matter for a subtle understanding.

We are still at the beginning of the journey, all 25 years after perestroika we have mastered what world architecture has gone through during our time behind the Iron Curtain. The works of these years are trials, the transfer of different methods, different styles and foreign practices to the Russian soil. I think the next step is to think about what we want from our architecture. We have something to rely on: for example, the unique wooden architecture, which is not found anywhere else in the world. Historically, Russia is a country of forests. The forests have remained, the wood has remained, the climate has remained, the landscape features have not gone away either, so think about what modern wooden architecture is in For Russia, the solution is on the surface.

Of course, it is not necessary to rebuild Kizhi. We need to see what circumstances led to the emergence of a unique wooden architecture and see which of these factors continues to operate now. I think we'll find a lot of similarities. Behind the tree, I see a unique perspective of Russia. Yes, the craft tradition has been lost, but there is, for example, Nikolai Belousov, who works superbly with wood. This is an example of where modern Russian architecture could grow from.

It seems to me that the perception of wooden architecture as the construction of country cottages is a stereotype. If we look at world practice, we will see that multi-storey buildings, almost skyscrapers, are being built from wood. Industrially recycled wood is becoming a mass-produced material not only for country houses. Russia has conservative, backward standards for wood, which do not yet allow the construction of multi-storey public and residential buildings made of wood.

But the situation is changing, and I think that in another seven or ten years we will see a new era in wooden construction. This is just one of the possible predictions.

We return to the issue of the cultural component of architecture. We will not create a national architecture from technology or business, we can create it only from our cultural characteristics, our national character.

Russia has everything ahead of it.