ARCHITECTUREwooden architecture — research, maintenance and restoration

• Exposition sector:Russians of Zaonezhye
• Date of construction:Early 18th century
• Builder:
• Original location:Medvezhyegorsk District, the Island of Kizhi., Медвежьегорский
• Overall dimensions:37.0×20.0×29.0
• Building materials:pine, spruce, aspen.
• Protection:Cultural heritage Site of the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), The structure is under federal protection, Cultural Heritage Site of Special Value of the Russian Federation.

The basis of the design of The Church of the Transfiguration is an octagonal log framework called ‘vosmeric’, with an annex facing each of the cardinal directions. The eastern annex (where the altar is located) is a half-hexagon addition in plan. A low-rise narthex, where the refectory is located, links on to the church from the west. In elevation, the large, base octagon carries on it two successively smaller octagons at higher elevations. Each of the upper octagons is supported on the octagon below by a series of ‘tetrahedron beams’ and also stabilized by hidden, inclined struts.

The Church of the Transfiguration of Our Saviour is crowned with 22 onion-shaped domes built on a cascade of barrel-roofs of the annexes and octagons. The shape and size of the domes vary from tier to tier. The refectory is covered with a three-slope roof. The entry is a roofed porch with two opposed and flanking flights of stairs supported by corbels. The landing at the top of the stairs and landings at the two bottoms are covered with gable roofs supported by carved columns.

Log joists are notched into walls, and on top of these is a floor of half-logs fitted tightly to each other along their long sides.

The ceilings are composed of thin planks in the church annexes that are also notched into the log walls. A ‘sky ceiling’, i.e. an architectural ceiling that holds icon-panels, covers the centerpiece. This ‘sky ceiling’ features a circular medallion at its apex that structurally is a kind of a roof truss.

An inside gable roof installed above the ‘sky ceiling’ rests on the octagon, and two drainpipes direct stray rainwater to the outside of the structure. Additional drainpipes were installed under the primary drains as a failsafe. In the uppermost octagon there is a quadrangular cribwork of sawn timber (flitches) to support the axial pole of the highest dome. The roofing of the refectory and porch are made of spruce and pine boards with birch-bark insulation. Birch posts were also used in some of the domes.

The church’s barrel roofs have the same construction as the roofs of local granaries, etc. The church domes are space-frames covered with carved aspen shingles. The exposed edges of the shingles resemble rising and descending steps. Decorative roofing boards on the refectory and barrel roofs have lance-like ends at the eaves. The refectory roof has a truss construction. The main doorway, and two additional doorways in the northern and southern narthexes, connect the refectory and the sanctuary. In the northern narthex there is a door to the gallery previously used to connect with the bell-tower, and now lost.

The central, main room is an octagon with three annexes lit by two windows in each of the northern and southern narthexes; one window is found in the western annex, south-western and north-western walls of the octagon. The altar is lighted by three windows in the southern, eastern and northern walls. The refectory is lighted by three small windows. Along the refectory walls, and the inside of the western facade, there are banks that feature fretted fascia boards.

The iconostasis of the Church of the Transfiguration has a carved, gilded frame carrying the individual icons. The frame is composed of four tiers and includes a total of 102 separate icons. The date of construction is not known with precision: probably late 18th to early 20th Century. From the style and date of creation, the icons can be divided into three groups: the two oldest icons are ‘The Transfiguration’ and ‘The Intercession’, and these date from the late 17th Century and represent typical ‘northern paintings’. Most of the icons belong to the second group and are found in the lower ‘local’ tier in the iconostasis; they date from the second half of the 18th Century. The icons of the upper tiers belong to the third group and date from the early 18th century; these icons had been brought to Kizhi from other originations.

The church is set on a loose-rock foundation according to dry-stack wall technique; rubblework was added only under the western narthex in 1870. The logs of exterior walls are notched at the corners according to the traditional method with the log ends protruding or extending beyond the corners of each wall (‘v oblo’), while the corners of the interior walls were built according to the traditional method with the log ends not protruding beyond the corners (‘v lapu’).