The actor invited “Antenna” to a country house built without a single nail, and admitted that he was saving him from unemployment. Left without filming due to the pandemic, he devotes almost all of his time to woodcarving.
January 21 2021
First they bought one plot, then they bought the second one – only 60 acres. My wife Tatiana wanted a stone house, and I only wanted a wooden one, because it’s warmer in the tree. We live in a city in stone, and when you come here, you start breathing nature. In a wooden house, I plunge into my childhood. I was born and raised in Leningrad, but every summer I went to a village on the outskirts of the town of Opochka in the Pskov region. They lived there in an ordinary hut. In this way, I wanted to revive my memories.
Tatyana wanted the house to be even larger – with a dining room, a living room, but I decided that I would not heat such a dwelling and I would have to work exclusively for firewood. According to the Eastern calendar, I am a Bull and sometimes I can very strongly push my horns. Allowed only to make a bay window.
When we started to build, I did not even know that outside the city you can make a house with running water and not go to the water heater, conduct steam heating, and the fireplace is just for fun. Now I really regret that I did not give Tatyana room, and our dining room turned out to be actually on the aisle.
Initially, we were advised to order the construction of a house from a Finnish company, but we decided to involve our craftsmen, Arkhangelsk. The tree is the same, but for the Finns it is twice as expensive. This is an ordinary pine that the Finns buy in Arkhangelsk!
The house was designed by Tatiana. And when we built it, she agreed that the wooden one was the right decision. We sent the project to the director of the firm. He cut down the pine at the right time – in the cold, in winter. It was the second half of February. He made a blockhouse, which for a certain time sagged with him in Arkhangelsk. And six months later, he took it apart, marked each log, sent his team. The foundation was already ready. The whole house with a garage and a furnace – 240 meters.
Here we have a winter garden, where you can get comfortable with a book. We have an assistant, Anya, who helps us around the house and the plot, mows the lawn, and grows flowers. The royal red flower should bloom for the wife’s birthday in January.
We started building in 2001, and the first time my wife and I spent the night here in 2005. Since then, as far as possible, we have come here from Moscow. There is a completely different smell here than in a concrete box. And the house also walks, although it stands on the foundation. It obviously depends on the weather: the tree is gaining moisture, then it dries. You hang the picture exactly, and in a month you arrive – it has already moved a little. We also have an old walking clock that will only walk if it hangs exactly vertically. I put them vertically, and they walk, walk, then suddenly they stood up. Something has shifted slightly. I correct – and they go again. So the house is alive.
Our tree is unique – Karelian pines. If you look at the cut, you will not see the pores. And the trees of our middle lane are loose between the rings. The log is not wide, the diameter is only 18 cm, and the house is very warm, because the tree is dense. There is not a single nail here: the log is cut and stacked on top of each other, and pressed moss is placed between the logs. So that he would not be seen at the joints, Tatiana came up with white ropes, several kilometers of which were ordered at a factory in Yaroslavl. The workers implemented this design and said that they liked it very much and now they will offer it in Italy and France.
I believed that if we make a wooden house, then everything in it should be so old-noble, without pretentious things. Here you will not see anything superfluous. This is an antique mirror with a chest of drawers. On sofas, pillows with covers are required, which can be removed and washed. No gold, everything is very modest. The table gathers on the sides, and you get such an old Pushkin table: there is a candle, an old lamp. And the picture is a gift from Ekaterina Rozhdestvenskaya. On it I, my wife, our son Vasily and our dog Nils, who died two years ago.
In the summer we set up a table in the open air with a barbecue and a guest house. In it, the second and third floors are for our son, and the first is for guests. There is a two-room apartment: a kitchen-dining room, a living room with a double sofa bed, and a bedroom with a large wide bed. We have guests often. The other day, a friend of mine Vera Musatova, head of the press service of the International Film Festival “Kinoshock”, the first wife of Alexander Mikhailov, came to visit.
We have spinning wheels in the bathroom. Previously, there was a Jacuzzi in their place, but it leaked, it was removed, and the hole was covered with a spinning wheel. And a favorite picture with a fish hangs above it, a friend gave it. Such a New Year’s interior in peace and quiet, in the morning with a cup of coffee.
By the way, about television. Long ago I noticed that Ivan Urgant in his program sometimes plays with the guests in guessing the artists from the photo. Whoever gives the most correct name in the allotted time is a fine fellow. And so they always end up with my picture! And I do not mind, although no one warned me about it, I saw it myself.
I love Vanya. In one of my first films about border service, my mother was played by his grandmother Nina Urgant. So I have very pleasant memories associated with this surname. Vanya makes a very witty, worthy, interesting program, in which it is an honor to appear.
In our house, I set up a workshop where I create all sorts of handicrafts. And Tatiana has her own office, where she writes books on history. Against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic, we have been practically living here since March last year. There are no performances, no filming, so I’m almost never out here. Sometimes, except that they are invited to television.
In my workshop, during the quarantine period, I did four works, including the icon of the Vladimir Mother of God. I have professional wood carving equipment and have been doing this for thirty years. And the first thing that he created was an African mask. Speed depends on inspiration. I have been doing one job for ten years. After breakfast I leave for my workshop and after lunch I go there too.