Beautiful Sunday: a walk in the Brusnitsyn cultural quarter

A few days ago I walked around the Sevkabel Port space on the shore of the Gulf of Finland. This time I am going to walk around a similar space, it is called Brusnitsyn and it is also located on Vasilievsky Island, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, not far from the Sevkabel Port space. The Brusnitsyn cultural quarter (Kul'turnyy Kvartal Brusnitsyn) was created on the site of an old factory and uses old production buildings. The success of the first creative spaces, such as Sevkabel Port and New Holland, has been an inspiring example, now there are several new spaces of this type in the city. The Brusnitsyn Cultural Quarter started its existence recently, and some of the old factory buildings are still standing in ruins and waiting to be renovated.

I believe that the main attraction of the Brusnitsyn Cultural Quarter is the quay. The embankment is equipped with comfortable benches and deck chairs, several swings are installed, designed for the weight of an adult. It is very pleasant to be on this embankment in summer. A little bit in the back, in the space inside the old walls of the big workshop, there are sports grounds. In summer, you can play ball sports or table tennis there. In winter, this space is transformed into an ice-skating rink. The ice-skating rink is usually open until mid-March and has now ceased to operate, but the ice-skating rink structure has not yet been dismantled.

It had snowed during the night and the surface of the ice-skating rink was a beautiful white surface. I went up to the wooden platform to see how the renovation work was progressing around the outer wall of the building. Nothing seemed to have changed there in the last six months - the repairs would probably continue into the summer. The inner walls of the factory building became a place for street art artists to exhibit their work. The sun was shining very brightly and most of these works were in deep shadow, but I took a few photos.

During my walk I noticed a few people walking their dogs on the seafront. This is quite a rare occurrence as the seafront is not a dog walking area. I enquired as to what was going on and it turned out that the Way Home Festival was underway. It's a charity project that helps shelter dogs and cats find their new homes. In a huge hall there were enclosures with dogs and cats. Volunteers held quizzes and masterclasses.