The mansion at 27 Bulvarno-Kudriavska Street, known as the Baron Steingel Mansion, is an interesting example of late 19th and early 20th century urban development and an architectural monument.
History
The plot on which the mansion was later built belonged to Princess S. Kudasheva since 1872. In 5 years, the estate with a two-story brick mansion, a park, and auxiliary buildings was acquired by Rudolf Steingel (1841-1892), a baron, railway engineer, and developer of the theory of wind engines for rural estates. In 1877-1879, the new owner commissioned a one-story extension to the mansion.
In 1901, the manor was purchased by doctor Mykhailo Lapynskyi (1862-1926), a professor at Kyiv University, head of the Department of Neurology and Psychotherapy. He founded a 75-bed physiotherapeutic sanatorium (hydrotherapy, light therapy, electrotherapy) in the house, where he introduced the method of hydraulic massage. The sanatorium operated until 1919. Among its famous patients was Ukrainian writer Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky.
Since the 1920s, the estate has been occupied by various medical institutions, and since 1927 by the Kyiv Research Psychoneurological Institute. During the Second World War, it housed a hospital and later a sanatorium. Since 1952, the Ukrainian Research Institute of Orthopedics and Traumatology has been functioning, and since 1965, the Kyiv Research Institute of Orthopedics. In 1976-1981, the oldest part of the mansion was demolished, and a new large building for the Institute of Orthopedics was constructed. Since 1991, the Ukrainian Research Institute of Traumatology and Orthopedics has been operating in the mansion.
Architecture
The mansion is a two-story brick building, rectangular in plan, with a basement, porch, entrance, and terrace. The facades are decorated with English Gothic elements: characteristic outlines of window and door openings, dentil wall finials, Gothic pattern of the stone balcony fence, a lion's head mascaron, a sculpture console, etc. The southwestern corner of the house is completed by a decorative tower, where, according to an ancient knightly custom, a flag was raised to signify the owner's presence at home. The metal forged lattice of the stained-glass loggia has the initials of the owners arranged in a pattern, in particular, “R.S.” (Rudolf Steingel). The interiors are decorated in the Neo-Renaissance style. The artistic molding of the ceilings and walls is characterized by the meticulousness of the details. Unique works of applied art have been preserved: exquisite fireplaces lined with polychrome tiles and carved white marble, wooden panels, cast iron casting and forged metal fencing of the main staircase, etc. The remains of the once landscaped landscape park have been preserved.
Famous residents
In addition to the baron himself, his son Fedir Steingel (1870-1946), a public, political, and cultural figure, member of the First State Duma, and ambassador of the Ukrainian state in Berlin, lived in the house. In the early 1920s, the mansion was home to Valentyn Hakkebush (1881-1931), a psychiatrist, doctor of medicine, professor, one of the organizers of the Kyiv Research Psychoneurological Institute, and chief physician of the Kyiv Psychiatric Hospital.
