Gum in Soviet times. Gum: the ussr, which did not exist. Fashion show, cinema and skating rink

One of Europe's largest department stores occupies an entire block, and its main façade overlooks Red Square. The current building was built in the pseudo-Russian style in 1890-1893 by architect Alexander Pomerantsev and engineer Vladimir Shukhov.

On December 2, the grand opening of the "Upper Trading Rows" took place ...


Trade has been going on in this place since the time of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, by his order in 1664 a guest house was built on the square, and later, under Catherine II, planning for a new building began. It was developed by the royal architect Quarenghi Giacomo, after which Osip Bove took up the project: its trading rows existed until the end of the 1880s, until they became obsolete and it was decided to build new ones.


In the open "Upper Trading Rows" one could buy anything: GUM had its own hairdresser, restaurant and even a post office. According to some reports, price tags appeared there for the first time in the city, since the store area became too large to say the price of each product and it was there that the book of offers for buyers first appeared: the ranks took care of their opinion, trying to take into account the wishes of customers.


October 1917 was a decisive moment not only for the life of the country, but also for the Upper Trading Rows, which, like the rest trade enterprises were nationalized. Soon after the October events, all the owners of the Upper Trading Rows were deprived of their goods and premises.


In 1918, Soviet institutions appeared here, and the Upper Trading Rows began to live a monotonous, monotonous life, "there was no smell of the spirit of trade here." Desks and telephones appeared in all the premises, officials began to work in the former shops.


Communal apartments for officials were arranged on the second and third floors - there was not enough housing for everyone in the new capital at that time. By the way, the last tenants from GUM were evicted only in 1959, and the last institution - the office of the printing house - in 1995.


Poet Vladimir Mayakovsky composed 12 advertising poems for GUM. GUM was the first customer to advertise Mayakovsky exactly as a state store: Everything that requires // stomach, // body // or mind, // Everything for a person // is provided by GUM. Or here's something else, for example: Give the sun // at night! // Where // can you find // him? // Buy in GUM! // Dazzling // and cheap.

The artist Alexander Rodchenko drew the coat of arms of GUM - a circle with the letters GUM in the center - in different variations this coat of arms existed for all Soviet time... And Mayakovsky composed a slogan for him: Grab // this // life buoy! // Good quality, // cheap, // first-hand!


In the mid-1920s, trade in GUM sharply decreased and various departments and representative offices began to transfer to the vacated premises. Some part of the area was allotted for the housing of employees.


Nevertheless, in 1923, the first GUM, the State Department Store, was opened in the building of the former Trade Rows, where stationery, watches, and hygiene items were sold. The name GUM was not exclusive - then in many cities of the country their own GUMs appeared


GUM in 1931
Until the early 1950s, GUM was a government agency, its second life began in 1953, when it opened as a store with 11 departments. By order of Anastas Mikoyan, in 1953 all offices and tenants were evicted, and the GUM itself was again turned into the main store in Moscow. In 1987, the Eliseevsky store joined it.


Eleonora Garkunova, who lived in GUM, in communal apartments, for the first 25 years of her life, from 1928 to 1953:
“At 8 in the morning, when the shops were opening, the whole GUM could hear the stamping of feet, people on duty since the night were in a hurry to take a queue at the departments - even in our room it was audible. By this noise, we determined the time (and also by the Kremlin chimes, which were visible from the window). Although there was no stampede in GUM then. After the war, you could buy a lot without a queue. "


“When the funeral of Nadezhda Alliluyeva was held there in 1932, the residents of GUM received something. Later I saw very beautiful flowers in pots at our neighbors, and when I asked where they came from, I was told that after Alliluyeva's coffin was taken to the cemetery, the flowers from the hall were allowed to be taken apart from room to room.


“Comrades in civilian clothes were always on duty in the street, I knew them all by sight, and they knew me. Once my mother put my felt boots on the windowsill to dry, and they were blown down - the frightened "comrades" immediately came running with a check, my mother even had to write an explanatory letter "


In the 1930s and 1940s, GUM was a collection of different institutions under one roof, not a single store. It was from GUM that on May 9, 1945, Yuri Levitan read on the air a message about the surrender of Nazi Germany.


“The most important client of a wonderful shop studio, the first lady of the state, the wife of Leonid Ilyich, came to GUM to try on a fur coat. She smiled at the cutter she knew and asked why he was so sad. He said that an order had come to the trade ministry from the Central Committee itself - it was decided to close GUM. The first lady left in a determined mood. And soon it became known that the decision to close it was canceled. "


More than once, difficult situations fell on the fate of GUM. It could even be demolished. So, in 1947, the architect of the Mausoleum Shchusev expressed his opinion that the store was interfering with Red Square and proposed to demolish it. The decision seemed to be made. But soon Shchusev died, and they forgot about the demolition of the store.


And in 1953, an active reconstruction of the building began. Within a few years, the queues at GUM were longer than at the Mausoleum. Muscovites and guests of the city could stand in anticipation of the desired purchase for almost the whole day. By the way, such people were called “humanists”.


The structure of the sales area of ​​the department store consisted of 11 sales departments: textiles, ready-made dresses, footwear, knitwear and underwear, dishes and household goods, furniture and carpets, furs and hats, stationery and toys, cultural goods. The assortment presented in trading floor goods consisted of more than 30 thousand items.


A significant event for the fashion world took place in 1959: an airplane with 12 Christian Dior models arrived in Moscow, which were shown at GUM new collection clothes of Yves Saint Laurent.


If you ignore the long lines shopping, since that time the approach to trade in GUM has become quite modern. There were consultants who could advise on what product to buy, and you could even consult a nutritionist there. Daily shopping mall visited by about 200 thousand people. Just imagine what a huge figure this is, considering that about 5 million people lived in Moscow at that time.


The GUM showroom, the store itself and its galleries have repeatedly flashed in Soviet cinema: for example, in the movie "I Walk Through Moscow"


Director Nikita Mikhalkov: “In my mind, GUM exists not as the largest store, but as a film set. For me, he is forever connected with those hot days when we filmed "I walk around Moscow." Everything then was filled with excitement, joy of working with Georgy Danelia and my partners in the film.


In this entire huge building, there are only two places for me: the bridge where the three of us are standing and the patch where our stage with Zhenya Seblov was, when we swear, and after that he goes to the army "


Elena Metelkina, one of the most famous models of the GUM Demonstration Hall: “There used to be a different school in GUM than it is now. An old school. The audience sat very close. The podium was high, about twenty meters, narrow, and behind it immediately began wooden chairs, like in cinemas.

The audience had to look up, but for some reason they really loved to sit in the first row. Probably, in order to better consider all the lines of the cut, to delve into all the details, since they were going to sew these dresses themselves. Then they bought our pattern magazines. "


In 1954, GUM began selling ice cream. It began with the rebirth of GUM itself, which took place after reconstruction in 1953. They organized a shop in the store and cooked right there.

Despite the fact that many production processes were automated, GUM ice cream is still made manually and the technology, like the ice cream recipe, has not changed since Soviet times. The manufacturing process is kept a closely guarded secret.


By 1970, GUM became the largest shopping center in the Soviet Union. And in 1990 the doors of GUM finally opened from the side of Red Square. Prior to this, the main entrance was closed for over 60 years.


Agree, not every store can be proud of the fact that it opened more than 100 years ago, but it works today, and moreover, it is very popular. If the walls of GUM could speak, for sure, they could tell no less than the most complete textbook on the history of Russian fashion.
















On December 2, 2013, the most famous store in Russia - GUM - celebrated its 120th anniversary. And the 60th anniversary of the second birth.

Trade on the territory of modern GUM has been conducted since the 15th century. The historical name of the complex is the Upper Trading Rows. Initially, Nikolskaya, Ilyinka and Varvarka divided all trade opposite the Kremlin into Upper, Middle and Lower rows. Each block inside was divided into rows, according to the nature of the goods: Bell, Kaftan, etc. In the 15th – 16th centuries. trade was carried out in wooden shops, under Boris Godunov in 1596-1598. stone buildings also appeared, but, despite frequent fires, the replacement of wood with stone proceeded very slowly. In the 1780s. the front part of the Upper Rows from the side of Red Square received a second floor and an arched facade with a ten-column portico. A project for a complete overhaul of the complex was developed, but not fully implemented.

The fire in 1812 completely burned out the rows, but by 1815 a new complex was built according to the project, again classic: with a portico and a dome. The side parts in the shape of the letter "G", facing Nikolskaya and Varvarka, received the popular nickname "verbs". The building was decorated with bas-reliefs in the form of female figures carrying laurel wreaths, and the coat of arms of Moscow was placed on the main portico from the side of the square. There were 32 stone buildings in total. But this complex also fell into disrepair: the crossings, littered with goods, turned into narrow slums, the premises were poorly lit and, in order to avoid fires, were not heated. In 1887, the complex was closed, and temporary shops from 14 iron buildings were installed right on Red Square. The specially created Joint Stock Company of the Upper Trading Rows on Red Square in Moscow held a competition in which the project won. The work was carried out in 1890-1893. On December 2, 1893, the complex was inaugurated.

Although the architect departed from the classicist style in favor of the pseudo-Russian one, the structure of the complex remained the same: lines, aisles and wide windows. The elongated "terem" roofs and tents with spiers over the main entrance are in harmony with the Kremlin towers. Thanks to the engineers and A.F. Loleitu passages ("rows") received glazed roofs. The building had its own power station, which illuminated the rows and Red Square, a water supply system and an artesian well. In total, there were 1,200 shops and three meeting rooms. In 1897, a cinema was created in one of them.

After the revolution, the apartments of famous government officials (for example, the People's Commissar for Food Tsyurupa) and a number of offices were located here. In the 1930s. there were projects for the demolition of the building and the construction of a multi-storey building of the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry, but then they were abandoned. Trade returned in 1952–1953: the rows were restored and given a new name - the State Department Store (GUM). Nowadays GUM has no state status, but the established name has been retained. It has become an integral symbol of Red Square. The fate of the Upper Rows remained connected with trade. The Middle Rows, which had passed into the jurisdiction of the military, are now awaiting a decision on their fate, and the Lower Rows have been completely lost.

The old building of the Upper Trading Rows, the Main Department Store - GUM in Moscow is located. It is the largest department store in the country. It is an architectural monument of federal significance.

GUM in Moscow - history

Not many shops in the country and in the world have such an interesting and rich history as the largest one in the capital. The building of the Upper Trading Rows (the former name of the department store) was built in 1893 by the architect A. Pomerantsev and engineer V. Shukhov. The opening was attended by Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich Romanov and Princess Elizabeth Feodorovna. The length of the building along the Kremlin wall is about 250 meters. And its shape is presented in the form of three longitudinal three-storey galleries. Engineer V. Shukhov created a unique openwork glass roof, the construction of which took more than fifty thousand pounds of metal. Its diameter is 14 meters.

The entire area of ​​the opened Upper Trading Rows was divided among merchants into 322 stores, which sold all kinds of food and industrial goods. A bank branch and a post office, a jewelry workshop and a hairdresser were also opened here. For the first time, price tags began to be used. Books of complaints and suggestions have appeared. And the slogan "The buyer is always right" became the rule of trade. The restaurant soon opened. Musical evenings began to be held. Exhibitions of paintings were organized. Now people came to the Upper Trading Rows not only for shopping. Here we rested, had fun. You could use a luggage room, information desk, wardrobe.

After the revolution, like others outlets, GUM was nationalized. This led to a decline in trade. Officials were housed in the offices. NEP revived trade. In 1935, a project appeared, fortunately not implemented, according to which it was proposed to demolish the building in order to expand Red Square. On May 9, 1945, from the building of the department store, Yuri Levitan announced the unconditional surrender of Germany. In the post-war years, the threat of being demolished again hung over the department store. A place was required to erect a monument in honor of the Victory in the war. But this plan was not implemented either.

1953 was the year of the building's rebirth. It was decided to remove all institutions from it and leave only retail outlets and salons in it. The building was reconstructed. More than 30 thousand items of goods were presented in 11 large departments.

At the time of Brezhnev, the department store again wanted to close. But chance helped. The wife of a high-ranking official sewed outfits for herself here - in the atelier. Thanks to her request to keep it, the department store was also saved.

In December 1990, the department store was renamed Joint-stock company"Trading house GUM". That is, the form of activity has become the same as it was 100 years ago. In 1993, the 100th anniversary of the opening of the department store was celebrated. The entrance was opened from the side of Red Square.

GUM - modernity

Modernity brings its own features to the look of GUM. The department store is constantly evolving. The Showroom has been rebuilt. It hosts various cultural events. Illumination installed on the external facade. Since 2006, a skating rink has opened on Red Square in winter. A match between the stars of the USSR and the stars of the World was held here. The skating rink has become a place of rest and meeting. The festive atmosphere, performances of celebrities always delight the guests of the skating rink. In 2007, a fountain opened in the center of the department store, where visitors meet. This fountain is almost the same age as the Upper Trading Rows.

Familiar objects of the capital also appeared here, in which the appearance of the 50-60s has been preserved. For example, Gastronome No. 1 has been opened, where tea "with elephants" is sold. Canteen No. 57 has a self-service line with dishes of Russian and European cuisine. It also offers refreshing and alcoholic drinks... The Festivalnoe cafe, named after the Youth Festival held in the capital in 1956, was opened. The menu includes dishes from different countries.

GUM is not only an architectural monument. It is a recreational area with restaurants and cafes, as well as a venue for cultural events. Like the entire Red Square, it is an integral part of the history of Russia.

GUM shops

The department store is conventionally divided into 3 lines, along which there are many shops and boutiques, salons on three floors. There are more than 200 of them. A variety of products of popular domestic and foreign brands are presented - Adidas and Nike, Levi’s and Ecco and many others. There is a pharmacy and a bank branch, photo services and a table of orders. Although now the department store is not state-owned, the name GUM is still popular. Its main owner is the Russian company Bosco di Ciliegi. Holders of Bosco di Ciliegi family cards in the shops "Optics" and "Hogl", "Gabor" and some others enjoy fixed discounts from 5 to 15%. More than 30 thousand people visit the department store every day.

For visitors of GUM in Moscow, parking is provided in Vetoshny lane.

Probably, it was near this hill that I understood why I wandered around GUM as if spellbound and could not bring myself to leave. She awakens vague memories of the central hall of the Children's World and children's delight at the sight of such an incredible toy abundance. And these siphons, from which the sellers poured juice - they are from the same place, from the same long-gone world.
In GUM, a world that has never existed in reality is being recreated, one where the familiar attributes of Soviet life are combined with the abundance of commodities in modern Russia. This world never existed - it existed only on the pages of the Ogonyok magazine and the Book about tasty and healthy food. And it also exists in the backyard of memory, though without reminders in the form of familiar, but forgotten objects, it is almost impossible to extract it from there. It is all the more surprising to plunge into it again - not in the form of vague children's images and not through the shots of a totalitarian film, but like this, alive, with your own eyes, with all five senses.
Well, let's go?

The first thing you come across is an ice cream stand. Sell ​​popsicle and cups

And closer to the new year, a parade of Christmas trees begins - and it doesn't matter that they advertise brands

And before the new year Christmas decorations they sell - they seem to be new, but ... both Santa Claus and the Snow Maiden, and Puss in Boots - it seems as if they are from there, from that country "where there is no road"

Here's another "iconic" corner. We had such a player and a radio (top left). And my grandmother had a radio tape recorder. And another grandmother has a KVN TV with a huge lens.

Cinema entrance and cinema café corner

This establishment can hardly evoke nostalgic feelings: it reproduces the way it was before 1917. But it's still interesting.

The walls of the stairs are covered with photographs

I can't even call my tongue a "dressing room"

The interior is also not bad, although for 84 rubles I expected something more stunning (there are a lot of free places, so the price for the "entourage", I think, is still acceptable). As you can see, solid marble, changing rooms, cleaning ladies in aprons and other bells and whistles.

From what era this shoe shine is, I do not know.

And finally, the Grocery Store. Number one (although actually number one - it used to be Eliseevsky)

Here, pictures from the Book about tasty and healthy food were constantly recalled

Oh, how familiar everything is ... I could not resist, I bought a pack (28 rubles)

But I have never seen such coffee. Disappeared before I was born ??

And I don’t remember such sprat, I remember only in black and gold decoration. And the stew was, and more precisely, it was not)

By the way, prices are quite divine, significantly lower than in some ABC of taste. I could not resist, I bought two chocolates in a souvenir package with a monument to Pushkin, they turned out to be very tasty, just like the pastries.

In addition to what I have shown, in GUM you can:

Admire the building itself: built in 1890-1893, in a pseudo-Russian style, architect A. N. Pomerantsev, engineers V. G. Shukhov and A. F. Loleit (pay attention to the famous Shukhov mesh floors)

Not bad and relatively budgetary to eat, but I will tell you about this separately.
- Buy tickets to theaters and in particular to the Sovremennik theater (two kiosks selling tickets)
- Buy albums and souvenirs from the Pushkin Museum. Pushkin (kiosk)
Surely, there is still a lot of interesting things in GUM, because I have not yet mastered all of its nooks and crannies.
The only thing that you should probably not do in GUM is to use it for its intended purpose, that is, for shopping. In any case, my only attempt to buy a printer cartridge was unsuccessful: there were few pointers, I had to go through almost the entire store, and then go to buy a cartridge elsewhere. However, I do not understand much about shopping, so I will not insist on my assessment.
Regardless of shopping, next to Red Square there is an interesting and beautiful attraction where you can have a good time, which is especially important in bad weather (warmed up, rested, had a snack - and continued sightseeing). Moreover, this attraction is with a historical bias, so it well complements the excursion and educational part of the sightseeing of Moscow.

History of GUM

The Upper Trading Rows were opened on December 2, 1893. It was an exceptional project for Moscow and Russia - at that time it was the largest passage in Europe.

Passages - covered shopping streets - were conceived to be built at the beginning of the 19th century in Paris after the Napoleonic wars, under the impression of the covered bazaars of the Arab East (the oldest of them, Passage du Caire, was built in 1799). But these were just covered shopping streets; they began to gather in department stores only in the second half of the century. The closest analogue of GUM is the Victor-Emmanuel Gallery in Milan (1877), but our Moscow passage is one and a half times larger, and there is no trade in the Milan passage on the upper floors - there are no famous Gum bridges.

The Upper Trading Rows were deliberately created as a symbol of New Moscow. They were built on the traditional place of Moscow bargaining, there were endless shops, "half-shops", "quarter-shops", and although the rows overlooked Red Square with the proud classicist facade of Osip Bove, inside it vividly resembled the Grand Bazaar of Istanbul or Damascus.

After the reforms of Alexander II, Moscow was the place of the proud Russian merchants, who at that time fancifully combined earnest conservatism in the spirit of "autocracy, Orthodoxy, nationality" with an openness to technical progress and new ideas of capitalism. New Rows was supposed to become the most fashionable and technically advanced European department store, but in the "Russian style".

In February 1889, a competition for the project of the Rows was held, which was won by Alexander Pomerantsev, Roman Klein, who took second place, then built the Middle Trading Rows. Now it seems fantastic, but 4 years later - after the demolition of the old rows, after archaeological excavations, the finds from which were transferred to the Historical Museum, the rows were opened. Fully finished, with the glass skies of Vladimir Shukhov, with its own power plant, an artesian well, with wholesale trade in the basement floors, with telegraph offices, a bank, restaurants, hairdressing salons, showrooms, an atelier - the only thing without its own doors.

According to the original project of Alexander Pomerantsev, the Upper Trading Rows were 16 large separate buildings with glazed streets between them. It was a whole city, the ideal city of Russian commercial capitalism: silk and brocade fabrics by the Sapozhnikov brothers (6 Grand Prix at World Exhibitions), Mikhail Kalashnikov's watches (Lev Tolstoy and Pyotr Tchaikovsky bought Patek Philippe from him), the Aprikosovs' confectionery (suppliers of the imperial court with the right to print the national coat of arms on their boxes), Brocard perfumery (also a supplier of the imperial court. And also an official supplier of the Spanish royal court) and so on. However, on the upper floors of the lines, goods were much cheaper, and a huge two-story basement was used for wholesale trade(it was illuminated through glass lanterns in the floor).

In 1917, the trade was closed, the goods were requisitioned, the People's Commissariat for Food of Alexander Dmitrievich Tsyurupa, who pursued the policy of "food dictatorship" from here, was located. In Ryady there is a warehouse for the requisitioned food detachments and a canteen for co-workers.

In 1922, Vladimir Lenin decided that the policy of "war communism" would not allow the communists to stay in power, and announced the New Economic Policy (NEP). But first, he decided to try it in the Upper Trading Rows and on December 1, 1921, he signed the "Regulations on the State Department Store (GUM)". We do not feel a special taste in this word, it has become familiar to us, but meanwhile it is one of the few words that survived in the Russian language of the 1920s, something like the Red Army, Rabkrin, Potrebkooperatsia. All of them died as unnecessary - except for GUM. All of Moscow was sealed with GUM's advertisements, posters by Vladimir Mayakovsky and Alexander Rodchenko - GUM became a symbol of the NEP.

Stalin closed GUM in 1930, ministries and departments moved in here, the first line was completely closed for entry, here was Beria's office. Some kind of trade continued, Torgsin and a commission shop for the sale of property of the enemies of the people functioned near the fountain, a grocery store went out to Nikolskaya, but in general GUM ceased to exist.

Stalin twice - in 1935 and in 1947 - was going to demolish GUM, government decrees were issued twice, but his hands did not reach. He died on March 5, 1953. Above his coffin, his successor Georgy Malenkov proclaimed that Comrade Stalin bequeathed to us to keep peace between peoples, put forward the idea of ​​a long coexistence of the two systems and a reduction in international tension. The military budget was halved, intensive development began Agriculture and light industry- everything that later received the name "New Deal" by Nikita Khrushchev. But first they decided to try it in GUM - it was reconstructed and opened to the public on December 24, 1953. On December 23, Lavrenty Beria was shot, the newspapers reported this on one day. GUM has become a symbol of the thaw.

GUM has a unique destiny - it opened when Russia turned towards people, normal city life, even happiness. Fashion in GUM, a showroom, records in GUM, ice cream in GUM - all these have become Moscow symbols. And it all disappeared when we turned in a different direction.

GUM today

Today GUM lives the way it was once conceived - an ideal commercial city of Moscow, as if it had lived 120 years of its life without losses and disasters. Since 2007, the fountain in the center of GUM again pleases visitors - a legendary structure captured both in the official chronicles of the 20th century and in millions of private photographs (today the sound of a camera shutter sounds here about once every three seconds).

The legendary cinema hall, which went down in the history of Russian cinema, has been restored. A unique illumination project has been implemented on the external facade. Since 2006, the GUM Skating Rink has opened on Red Square, which immediately gained fame as the brightest ice rink in the capital. We revived the traditions of winter festivities on Red Square, which Moscow was famous for in the 19th century, but we also took on the bright and happy that was in the 20th.

GUM again operates Gastronome No. 1, which was once created by Anastas Mikoyan as a practical supplement to his “Book about tasty and healthy food”. The design, the clothes of the sellers, and even the presence in the assortment of some classic goods of the Soviet era (for example, the Three Elephants tea) Gastronome No. 1 takes us back to the 1950s and 60s, although this is, of course, a game. In essence, it is a store capable of satisfying the gastronomic whims of today's most discerning consumer.

In the same Soviet style, the Festivalnoye cafe and Canteen # 57 are made. The cafe is named after the Festival of Youth and Students, which took place in Moscow in 1957 and brought together 34,000 people from 131 countries of the world. Drawings, slogans in several languages, placed on the walls, remind of this event.

Canteen No. 57 is a classic self-service line, the idea of ​​which Mikoyan spied on in America in 1936, but was able to realize it only during the thaw era. True, the food is different: now there is good Russian and European cuisine, and not a “hamburger,” as Mikoyan called it, that is, not a “Mikoyan cutlet,” as the Soviet people called it.

GUM is not just a shop where you can buy almost everything. This is a whole shopping district, which has a pharmacy, a bank branch, and a flower shop ... This is an architectural monument. This is a comfortable recreation area with restaurants and cafes. It is an art gallery and cultural venue. This is an integral part of Russian history. It is a symbol of Moscow and it is the closest place to the Kremlin where you can feel in Europe.

Text: Grigory Revzin