Spherical Panoramas of the Naryn Guesthouse
In recent weeks I have taken the opportunity to post some of Victor’s 3D spherical panoramas of the Silk Road Lodge.
Last year, in fact, he conducted a similar exercise for our guesthouse in Naryn. I’ve been meaning to put them on the website but, for some reason, never got around to it.
For completeness sake I thought that I ought to fish out the files and show them to you here.
Unlike the Silk Road Lodge, the guesthouse in Naryn was not purpose built. We bought a block of apartments and converted them.
The apartment Block in the grounds. We laid out a large car park big enough to take twelve of more vehicles – there are twelve rooms – or a couple of large buses.
In the grounds around the guesthouse we had sufficient space for several yurts and during the summer season we erect eight yurts to give us eight more “rooms”, increasing to almost double the number of people that we can accommodate. This makes us one of the biggest hotels in Naryn.
Whereas the “mistakes” we made in the design of the hotel in Bishkek we our own fault, in Naryn they were forced upon us by the architecture of the existing building.
There were four apartments in the original building, connected by a central staircase. Like most of the common stairwells in Kyrgyzstan, it was pretty dark and dull … the steps were uneven;some small and other large. There wasn’t much we could do about the steps, but we were able to brighten up the staircase with a touch of paint and some decoration.
Although the steps mean that we are not exactly “wheelchair friendly” – indeed it’s unfortunately fair to say that the steps are a big handicap when it comes to catering for disabled guests … still, I am particularly pleased with several features of the stairwell:
First of all, there is the bright and fresh feel to the stairwell which is so uncommon in many buildings in Kyrgyzstan … I hope that it helps to make the place feel more “welcoming”.
Then there is the Chiy portrait of Kanykei, the wife of the legendary hero Manas, which stands at the top of the first half flight of steps and welcomes visitors … there is also a relief of the warrior himself placed over the door to the left, (created by the sculptor Misha Kalesnikov).
Finally, there is the Tuunduk erected over the stairs. The Tuunduk is the apex of a traditional yurt and is a symbol to the Kyrgyz of the traditional ”home” and hospitality – which is one of the reasons it was chosen as a symbol for the country’s flag.
One issue is the dining room; once again it’s in the basement … Originally it was upstairs, which was better, but the room was quite small and so we decided to renovate the cellar and move it downstairs. The room is quite large and airy and it was possible to create a large kitchen next to it in order to prepare the food. Although it is not ideal, it struck us as a fairly good compromise:
Bishkek