In the early 1980s, Kyiv officials saw the city’s need for another hotel. The project of the architect Avraam Miletsky was chosen for the construction (known for such works as Park of Eternal Glory, the crematorium at the Baikove cemetery, wall of memory at Baikove cemetery, Landscape alley). The hotel was built in 2 years (1982-1984; on the site of the bell tower (built in 1750) of the Nikolaev Military Cathedral (built in 1693); in the 1930s, the Soviet authorities blew up both the cathedral and the bell tower; now there is Palace of Pioneers) and was named “Salute”.
An unusual round building with a height of 7 floors, as it were, hangs over the road and resembles either a submarine, or a hedgehog, or a stack of some things stacked on top of each other that parted from the impact and now look that the whole structure will collapse . From a technical point of view, the Salyut Hotel is a load-bearing concrete pipe, on which 6 residential floors are cantilevered, having an ellipse shape in plan. Inside the pipe are elevators, communications and a spiral staircase. There is a restaurant on the second floor of the stylobate (common ground floor) part of the building. Above, under the roof, there is a second – a summer restaurant, which is still used as a conference room. There is parking in the basement of the building.
Initially, the hotel was planned to be 18 floors high, but at the very beginning of construction, the project had to be redone. The former chief architect of Kiev, Valentin Yezhov, told the details of this strange (officials under the USSR, as you know, adhered to an atheistic point of view, but in this case they decided to change their mind for some reason) at the time of the case:
– The older generation of architects is well aware of the sad story of the design of a hotel on Glory Square. How many times the author – Avram Miletsky – was summoned to Gosstroy and party authorities, demanding a sharp decrease in the height of the hotel! We traveled in a big company to the left bank of the Dnieper, to the area Hydropark and Rusanovki, visually tried on where the hotel would be visible from the upper edge of the slopes, and assumed how much it would compete with the bell tower Kiev-Pechersk Lavra. Under pressure from high authorities, the fate of the building was decided – instead of a beautiful, round, slender tower, they received a low barrel-shaped structure.
In any case, even in its original form, the Salyut Hotel still impresses both the people of Kiev and the guests of the capital. Not far from it is a monument to military pilots (Leonid Bykov), the Park of Eternal Glory and Askold’s Grave Park.
Where is Salut Hotel located?
Ivan Mazepa street, 11B