A communal apartment or kommunalka (Russian: коммуналка, коммунальная квартира) appeared in the Soviet Union following the Russian revolution. Communal apartments emerged as a response to the housing crisis in urban areas and were a product of the “new collective vision of the future”. A communal apartment was typically shared between two to seven families. Each family had it own room, which served as a living room, dining room, and bedroom for the entire family. The hallways, kitchen, bathroom and telephone were shared among all the residents. The communal apartment was the predominant form of housing in the USSR for generations, and still exist in “the most fashionable central districts of large Russian cities.”
Famous quotes containing the words communal and/or apartment:
“There is nothing in the world that I loathe more than group activity, that communal bath where the hairy and slippery mix in a multiplication of mediocrity.”
—Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977)
“The difference of the English and Irish character is nowhere more plainly discerned than in their respective kitchens. With the former, this apartment is probably the cleanest, and certainly the most orderly, in the house.... An Irish kitchen ... is usually a temple dedicated to the goddess of disorder; and, too often, joined with her, is the potent deity of dirt.”
—Anthony Trollope (1815–1882)