Sokol (Russian: Сокол) also known as "artists' settlement" (Russian: посёлок художников) is the first cooperative residential settlement in Moscow, founded in 1923. It is located in the Northern Administrative Okrug, not far from the later built Sokol metro station. The settlement "Sokol" became one of the embodiments of the garden city concept. Since 1979, the settlement has been under state protection as a monument to urban development of the first years of Soviet power. Since 1989, the settlement "Sokol" has been self-governing. The architects of the settlement "Sokol" implemented the concept of the "garden city", which was popular in the early 20th century. The idea of a settlement that would combine the best features of the city and the village was put forward by the British Ebenezer Howard in 1898. As early as 1903, a project appeared to build a similar garden city on Khodynka Field in Moscow. This project was being developed for some time, but the events of 1914-1917 prevented its implementation. The urban development plans of the 1920s – "New Moscow" by Alexey Shchusev and "Greater Moscow" by Sergei Shestako – also widely used the idea of a "garden city". The outskirts and suburbs of Moscow were supposed to be built up with settlements consisting of low-rise buildings, which were to have their own libraries, clubs, sports and children's playgrounds and kindergartens.
History
The original plan of the settlement "Sokol" (1923, architects B. M. Velikovsky, P. M. Nakhman). On August 8, 1921, Vladimir Lenin signed a decree on cooperative housing construction, according to which cooperative associations and individual citizens were granted the right to develop city plots. At that time, Moscow was in dire need of housing, and the authorities allocated very little money for its construction. The Sokol housing and construction cooperative society was formed in March 1923, and on April 11, the first organized meeting of the cooperative was held. The society included employees of the people's commissariats, economists, artists, teachers, agronomists, technical intelligentsia and workers. The first chairman of the board of the Sokol cooperative was the chairman of the Vsekohudozhnik trade union Vasily Sakharov. The cooperative leased a plot of land on the outskirts of the village of Vsekhsvyatskoye with an area of 49 dessiatines with the obligation to build it up with approximately 200 houses in 7 years. Already in the fall of 1923, construction of the Sokol settlement began there.
The members-shareholders of the cooperative were granted the right to use the living space for 35 years without any restrictions. The share contributions of the Sokol cooperative were 10.5 gold chervonets for joining, 30 for allocating a plot, and 20 for starting construction. The total cost of a cottage, which was paid over several years, was 600 chervonets. These were fairly high prices, which were not affordable for everyone.
Origin of the name
There is still no consensus on why the village was named Sokol. According to the most common version, this village was originally planned to be built in Sokolniki - hence the name. There was even a seal with an image of a falcon holding a house. However, plans changed later, and land near the village of Vsekhsvyatskoye was allocated for the village, but the housing cooperative retained its name. According to another version, put forward by the historian P. V. Sytin, the settlement was named after the agronomist and livestock breeder A. I. Sokol, who lived here and bred pedigree pigs in his yard. Another version says that the settlement got its name from a construction tool - the plastering falcon. Nikolai Markovnikov, the Vesnin brothers, I. I. Kondakov and other architects participated in the design of the settlement. Non-standard spatial solutions were used in the planning of the streets. The houses of the settlement were built according to individual projects. The construction of the settlement was mainly completed by the beginning of the 1930s. A total of 114 houses with all the amenities were built. As the settlement was being built, its social and household infrastructure was formed. Two grocery stores were built. The partnership opened a library and a canteen at its own expense. Two sports grounds were built in the settlement. A park was laid out on the odd side of Levitan Street. In 1927, a kindergarten was opened in the settlement "Sokol". Its staff included only one teacher, and the rest of the work was done in shifts by mothers on duty. In the late 1920s, the concept of developing Sokol with individual residential buildings was criticized. The ideology of that time assumed the construction of collective workers' houses. It is noteworthy that one of the critics of Sokol was the author of the general plan of the settlement and the architect of most of its houses, Nikolai Markovnikov. Taking into account the realities of the time, several apartment buildings for workers were built in the settlement in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
The settlement in the 1930s
In the early 1930s, part of the territory that had not yet been built up (between Vrubel Street and Volokolamsk Highway) was confiscated from the settlement of Sokol. Several residential buildings for NKVD employees were built there. In 1938, a four-story maternity hospital No. 16 with 200 beds was built on the site of the park in the center of the village. On May 18, 1935, an air crash occurred in the sky over the village of Sokol. The largest Soviet aircraft of that time, the ANT-20 "Maxim Gorky", collided with an escort fighter. The wreckage of the planes fell on the village. Everyone on board the planes died, but there were no casualties among the residents of the village. In 1936, cooperative construction in the country was curtailed. All houses in the village of Sokol became the property of Moscow. Many residents of the village became victims of Stalin's repressions, including the chairman of the cooperative V. F. Sakharov and the deputy chairman N. Ya. Yanek.
The village during the war
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