Stalin's Architect

The first biography to trace the remarkable life and career of Ukrainian-born Boris Iofan, beautifully illustrated with many of Iofan's previously unseen sketchbooks and photographs from private collections.

This is a history of architecture, politics and power. Boris Iofan (1891-1976) made his mark as Stalin's architect, both in the grand projects he achieved, such as the House on the Embankment, a megastructure of 505 homes for the Soviet elite, and through his unbuilt designs, in particular the Palace of the Soviets, a baroque Stalinist dream whose iconic image was reproduced throughout the Soviet Union. Iofan's life and designs offer a unique perspective into the politics of twentieth-century architecture and the history of the Soviet Union.

'Gorgeous pencil sketches … a breezy and readable text accessible to a broader, non-specialist audience … [Sudjic] deals with the cascade of names and denunciations, political shifts and relationships with agility and ease' - Edwin Heathcote, The Art Newspaper
'Deyan Sudjic conveys Iofan’s story in captivating fashion. The 100 photographs and drawings that accompany Sudjic’s text evoke something of the nature of the Stalinist era and the oppressive atmosphere in which Iofan lived and worked. Reading this cultural biography, you learn as much about Jewish life in Odessa in the late-19th and early-20th century, and the later strictures of Stalinist Russia, as you do about Iofan’s architectural prowess, so the book certainly has a broader interest too' - Beth Williamson, Art Studio international
'A fine biography of Boris Iofan' - Jonathan Meades, The Critic
'A forensic examination of Iofan’s work and private communications' - Literary Review
'Sudjic tells [Iofan's] story with brio' - Financial Times
'Sudjic’s book is a useful introduction to Iofan’s life and work … As Sudjic writes, the second half of Iofan’s career is “a cautionary tale of how damaging it can be to come close to political power, especially for an architect negotiating an accommodation with tyranny”' - New English Review

Deyan Sudjic is former Director of the Design Museum in London and architecture critic for the Observer. He has published many books on architecture and design for a popular audience, including The Edifice Complex: The Architecture of Power.

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