EPLAN.HOUSEIs the Russian stove so good? Or is it just nostalgia for the past?
One of my grandmothers lived in Arkhangelsk in a two-story log house typical of this region. Houses in Arkhangelsk were built earlier on two floors, in which the first floor is technical, they kept firewood and livestock, and in summer, one could live in one half of the house. The first floor was not heated. The second floor was also divided into two halves. In the non-residential half, which was called a lead, there was a toilet, the same as a street one, someone had a sauna, and most of them were household, served as a workshop or warehouse, there was even a ramp built so that a horse with a cart could get up.
The second residential half consisted of a large room - a drawing-room, adjoining a narrow space, more like a closet, although there was a window, it was grandfather room. Through the wall, there was a large kitchen. It was probably about 10 square meters, but about four meters occupied the Russian stove. Sleeping on it is hot, only in the morning, it was normal. Grandma got up at 4 or 5 in the morning to melt the stove and cook breakfast.
My husband and I visited her in January. That year, there was a frost minus twenty-five degrees, of course, the usual thing for Arkhangelsk. But despite the Russian stove, my grandmother slept in the kitchen. Because even in the next room, there was a frost. It might not be cold, but she kept the food there, it was chill there, like in a fridge, and the whole living space was not very large, no more than 40 square meters, nevertheless, the Russian stove could not heat all the rooms. Of course, the “Russian stove” is not “to blame” for this, but a log house that stores heat so poorly that no heat capacity can save. When the stove was heating, the kitchen became very hot. Still, in the evening, it became more relaxed. It was again briefly heated to warm the house and prepare the sandwiches and beautiful painted Arkhangelsk gingerbread cookies, which the grandmother was a craftswoman to make.
The second time she melted the furnace only for us because we are not accustomed to such temperature fluctuations. But the archangels are not afraid of either frost or work. I was especially struck by the path to the house - on the sides, there were snowdrifts above two meters. We were shocked when we learned that a grandmother, then 80 years old and no more than 160 cm tall, cleaned this path every morning.
Now that frame houses have become the norm of practical construction and retain heat well, you will not need to build a Russian stove, which takes up a lot of space in the house. A modern built-in wood fireplace with a tempered glass door will quickly heat the home and create a cozy atmosphere for relaxation. If you still don’t know how simple these fireplaces are to be built in a frame house, read this article. And you can choose a house plan with a fireplace in the catalog of frame house plans.
