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elenatria · 1 year

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Exactly a year ago, while Kaunas was still the European Capital of Culture 2022 (and I desperately wanted to make my Chernobyl locations trip to Lithuania for that reason also), I asked the facebook page of Vytauto pr.58 (that was the name of "Valery's apartment" building back then) if I could visit the apartment. They said sorry, the apartment is a private residency. So yeah, Karolis Banys and Petras Gaidamavičius, partners in life and also partners in architectural projects, did "lend" their apartment (not yet renovated) to the Chernobyl crew for the filming of Valery's apartment scenes, but after the renovation they were planning to live there themselves. I was devastated obviously but it was understandable. I mean look at those two, you wouldn't want to disturb their peace and quiet with your crazy artistic Chernobyl-related ideas, would you?

Last August Karolis was making Insta stories about the renovation of the apartment and I was bawling my eyes out that I would never get to see the lapis lazuli of those walls up close. TT__TT But I was like... okay? Maybe...?

Fast forward to today, when I found out that ONLY FIVE DAYS AGO there was an article saying that at the beginning of 2023, a year after my request, they turned their nest into a museum, with guided tours and everything.

😳😳😳

Here are some interesting highlights from these two articles:

We can't wait to see all 5 rooms of the apartment, especially since in 2018 In the spring, HBO filmed the series "Chernobyl" in this apartment.

in 1928 136 sq. m apartment has 5 rooms, a kitchen, a bathroom, a guest toilet, a couple of balconies and a terrace to Žaliakalnis.

During the Holocaust, almost all the Jews who lived in the house were killed, others were transferred to the ghetto or died in exile. UNTIL THE SECOND WORLD WAR, JEWISH FAMILIES LIVED IN THE HOUSE. IN THE MEMOIRS OF THE YOUNG JEWISH WOMAN SARA GINAITĖ-RUBINSON, IT IS WRITTEN THAT IN 1941 SHE SAW HOW WHITE-COLLARED PEOPLE SHOT FIVE JEWS OUTSIDE THE YARD OF THIS HOUSE. THEY ARE ACCUSED OF COOPERATING WITH THE SOVIETS, ALTHOUGH THIS WAS NOT TRUE.

After seeing the restored colors of the walls, the new owners of the apartment were at first stunned, and then they realized that such beauty cannot be left only to themselves - they decided to open the doors to the public. (my prayers were answered, there was a reason why I saved those insta stories after all 🙏.)

Upon entering the kitchen, the founders of the museum were intrigued by hinting that in 2018 scenes of the HBO series "Chernobyl" (dir. Johan Renck) were filmed in this apartment. The apartment of Valery Legasov, the main character of the series, was located here for a short time. The filmmakers pasted wallpaper on the walls and furnished the spaces with Soviet furniture. About 20 artists created the late Soviet interior for the film. Filming lasted only a few days, but about 180 people worked on it. The desk clock ticking in the film can be seen in the kitchen. (What?? Where?? No pics? Could they mean my precious Valery clock..? 💗)

6. More details about the filming will be provided by the founders of the museum to those who visit the tours.

😲😲😲

7. The private corridor (which connected the bedrooms, bathroom and kitchen) was also lined with boards. From this corridor you can enter the hall with the help of a waste door .

8. It is the only Amsterdam School building of its kind in Lithuania, built in a modern style closely linked to the art deco and art nouveau movements.

9. Before its restoration, apartment no.6 was used as a filming location for the hit HBO series Chernobyl, with its post-communist interiors appearing on screen. The third-floor residence has since been lovingly restored by its owners and museum founders, Karolis and Petras Banys, for its new public role.

10. ‘Petras and I bought the apartment in 2017 with the idea of living there,’ explained museum co-founder Karolis Banys. ‘But as soon as we did polychromic and chemic research of its colours and restored the entire apartment to what it was like in 1928, we understood that it’s not only our apartment, it’s the home of Henuchas Pumpianskis. [...] ‘We understood that we cannot keep it for ourselves only, but instead, we decided to open it… [to] the public, to show [its original] interior, which is very optimistic, colourful and inspiring.’

11. Through the two-hour guided tour (two hours omg), visitors learn about its colours and the mannered sculptures adorning the building’s columned portico.

12. Photographs of the apartment’s interiors during the post-communist era – and those taken during the production of Chernobyl, when it was used as the home of main character Valery Legasov – as also on display.

PS.: Is this Valery's living room where he talks with Ulana in ep. 5??

#chernobyl #kaunas #lithuania #craig mazin #valery's apartment #karolis banys #Petras Gaidamavičius #valery legasov

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elenatria · 2 years

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Sigh, comrades, I have some relatively "bad" news to share.

A million years ago (that is just as COVID started spreading all over the globe) we were searching for Chernobyl's filming locations, and back then we were under the impression that "Valery's apartment" was going to turn into a museum. In the last few months I must have made some posts with photos from the interior of what I thought to be the building where Valery received his first phone call from Boris, where he fed his cat, took out his garbage and decided to end his life. 😭 It turns out that some of the interior photos in my recent posts belonged to a completely different building, the Art Deco museum in Kaunas whose owners, Petras Gaidamavicius and Karolis Banys, also own "Vytauto pr. 58", Valery's apartment. The latter is a private residence that can only be visited from the outside (as I was told by their facebook page).

For those visiting Kaunas, the Art Deco museum seems like a perfect chance to see some of Kaunas' cultural and architectural history, and here are some links to give you a taste.

Instagram

Facebook

Site

It still bums me out tho that we can't visit the inside of Valery's apartment. 😢 We can only dream of it, sigh.

#chernobyl #valery's apartment #art deco museum #kaunas #lithuania #setting the record straight #sob

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