Vladimir Gelfreich

Vladimir Georgiyevich Helfreich or Gelfreikh (Russian: Влади́мир Гео́ргиевич Гельфре́йх; * March 24, 1885, Saint Petersburg, Russian Empire – August 7, 1967, Moscow, Soviet Union) was a Soviet and Russian architect, teacher, professor. Academician of the Russian Academy of Architecture and Construction Sciences (1947). Hero of Socialist Labour (1965). Two Stalin Prizes of the first degree (1946, 1949). Life V. Gel'freykh was born on March 24, 1885, in Saint Petersburg in the family of a civil servant. He graduated from the real school, and studied in private drawing school for two years. In 1906 he entered the Architectural Department of the Imperial Academy of Arts, which he graduated with honours in 1914, having completed the thesis project of the building of the State Council under the supervision of Professor Leon Benois. Even while studying at the Academy, he started to work in the studio of Academician Vladimir Shchuko, who had a significant influence on the further creative path of Gel'freykh. Beginning in 1918, Gel'freykh was the permanent co-author of Vladimir Shchuko; their cooperation continued until the death of Shchuko in 1939. The first cooperation work of architects after the October Revolution was the design and construction in 1922—1923 of the pavilions of the Foreign Department of the Russian Agricultural and Handicraft Exhibition in Moscow.