The Passions of the Garage in Yerevan

‘…she turned on the light, he closed the garage’ – are the opening lines of a popular song by the Soviet/Russian band Nautilus Pompilius ‘Warm Snow Was Falling’ [Падал теплый снег] released in 1990. It tells a story of two lovers from a small town. Both were married and, thus, could not meet publicly. The garage became their shelter, and then their tomb where they suffocated from carbon monoxide. A song which could have been based on true events. 

Garage clusters in Yerevan. Data from Open Street Map

The contemporary garage in Yerevan goes far beyond the walls that define it. It exists as a space of freedom, swaying away from the emotional pressures of the private familial realm, as well as the social demands of professionalism and ‘proper’ citizenship. Harboring such characters as entrepreneurs and craftspeople the informal ‘garage economy’ existed in Armenia’s capital for a while, but it maintained the garage in the realm of slightly obscured activities. Things started changing in the early 2020s. Diving into the backyards of Yerevan’s busy central streets, one finds, for a lack of a better word, ‘hipsterized’ garages hosting fashionable cafes, bars, and shops. From being concealed and marginal, garages are turning into penetrable public spaces and desired locations for creatives and the middle class. From closets of masculinity, they are increasingly being feminized. The success of ‘hipsterized’ garages in Yerevan with their rebellious vibe is quite evident. More and more garage owners are infrastructuring their spaces for new uses. Given the sky-rocketing real estate rent prices, they will probably find tenants further resulting in the changing appearance and sociality of the courtyards.

This text brings forth five stories of garages, uncovering struggles of newness and integration. I am hopeful they will inspire the readers to drift through Yerevan and explore these and other, less visible, gems of ‘garage economy’.

8rr – Origin of Garage ‘Hipsterization’ in Yerevan 

Contrary to the popular belief that ‘hipterization’ of garages in Yerevan was prompted by the in-migration of Russians after the start of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022, the process began already during the Covid-19 pandemic with an initiative by an Armenian-Russian couple.

The story of 8rr is linked to the background of my wife – told me Sasha who started the business with his wife Mariam – she was born and partially upbrought in Yerevan, absorbing and marveling the esthetics of the city with the messiness and coziness of garage businesses…When moving to Yerevan from Moscow we looked for an available micro-business location, a space that would be ours, which we could alter as we please…I numerously strolled the charming Yerevan yards with my child. That is how we found an absolutely abandoned garage with a tree. 

8rr object store on 17 Nalbandyan str. (currently closed). Photos courtasy of Sasha Mereskin

Sasha and Mariam wrote an add: ‘We will rent your garage for commercial use. Please call us’. The owner called out of pure interest – who would want to rent this wreck and for what kind of business? After lengthy negotiations, they gained owners approval and heavily remade the garage into a snug space: "I like the idea that residents have the right to change the city and produce new spaces. In Yerevan, the various extensions to housing are a sort of material statements... I wanted to take advantage of this liberty." 

The 8rr store in Sasha’s words hosted ‘feminine products’ – designer hand-crafted goods for the house – made by artists scattered all over the world: "We arrived in Yerevan with two suitcases…opening a shop with goods for the house was an important symbolic gesture, a way to create a new home for us too…"

8rr garage operated for around two years, but eventually the landlord ‘kicked them out’. Now, 8rr exists only online. Sasha is not sure what happened: "We decided not to go in-depth with this story. In the end, the garage is his [landlord’s] space of freedom and we must respect that."

‘Saryan Street Garage Cooperative’

As the story of 8rr unwinded, new businesses followed them forming a sort of entangled through the personal relations garage cooperative in and around Saryan street. Among them are the Voch Luis Voch Mut specialty coffee shop, Hummus Kimchi café, Volchok clothing store, and Rage Garage vintage shop. The ideas for the first two took shape during the pandemic, while the two others are a result of out-migration and business relocation from Russia after February 2022. 

Voch Luis Voch Mut

Karlen worked in the coffee sphere for a while and wanted to open his own coffee shop but understood that it was nearly impossible in Yerevan giving his limited funds. It was Sasha from 8rr who pitched him the idea to use a garage.

Originally from Vanadzor, at the start of our talk, Karlen recalled the stories of his relatives about the time after the Spitak earthquake when people lived in garages afraid of new earth tremors. At some point the metal garage that belonged to his family housed up to twelve people. Thus, the thought of garage being a space of that can host not just cars was not strange to him.

After a few months of searching, Karlen found a garage for rent with a beautiful grapevine on Saryan street. He recalls it was hard to convince the owner because of an Argentinian bar which was previously in the yard and produced numerous disturbances:

"During the months of garage renovation, each day I had conversations with the local residents explaining what the shop will be like, that there will only be coffee and no alcohol, no food… In Armenia, each resident sees the yard as a private space, extension of the house. Because they live here for a while, take care of the space, their kids play here… so they feel uncomfortable if other people come into the yard and act as they wish… Since opening in 2021, and until now I watch over people who come to the garage, so they don’t irritate the residents."

Being in a courtyard, Karlen notes, one has to abide to the cultural norms that are attached to such space: "Overall, no matter how you try to re-shape and re-make it, you still feel like being in a garage that is a part of a yard sociality."

Voch Luis Voch Mut specialty coffee shop, 16 Saryan str. Photos by MG

Hummus Kimchi 

Hummus Kimchi is a family business uniting a sister and a brother of Jewish origin and their spouses of whom one is Armenian and the other is partly Korean. Sasha, one of the owners, jokes that a café that specializes in Korean and Jewish cuisine in Yerevan is sort of mix of them four. With her husband Tigran, Sasha long lived between Moscow and Yerevan. The idea to open a café appeared on the agenda, when Sasha’s brother Dima finished a cooking course in Israel. She quickly understood that opening it in Yerevan would be easier and cheaper than in Moscow.

They were not looking for a garage per se. Rather just an affordable and cozy space with basic communications needed for the café and located near but not on the first lines of busy streets. Coming across the garage on which they eventually settled, she called the owner and enquired about communications. They were present, as well as tandoor: "Wow, I thought to myself, what was in that garage before?... Further we learned that the garage was re-made into a vegetable store, then a bakery, and later it hosted a nationalist party… It was a very weird place… But people though that our concept was also weird. The mix of cousins, garage, big communal table in a café in Yerevan – no one would sit there…"

Hummus Kimchi opened in early 2022 and eventually it turned out to be a success. This led to them opening the Shin bar right under Hummus Kimchi. Sasha notes that most clients of Hummus Kimchi are non-Armenian, yet over times the ratio changes: "We didn’t want to open a café for the ‘relocants’. Yes, we are migrants ourselves, but it is such joy to see how more and more locals are discovering our café...We are happy to see a diverse crowd who come with kids and pets, who feel home at our place."

Hummus Kimchi café, 16 Saryan str. Photo by MG

Volchok

In the neighboring garage to Voch Luis Voch Mut is the Volchok clothing store which opened in April 2022. The entrance door of the store resembles the grated window in the house opposite the garage. This small and cute detail makes the store a very organic component of the yard.  

Vasya and his colleagues came to Yerevan in March 2022 joining the first wave of Russian out-migration. Having several stores in Russia, upon arrived in Yerevan, they started searching for a space to host their business: "First, we saw one project in a garage – 8rr. Then when we saw the coffee shop [Voch Luis Voch Mut]. And I thought to myself: ‘This is a dream come true’. Maybe such perception is related to the fact that I used to hang out in and around garages as a child… Maybe it’s linked to the story of Apple. I don’t know… Anyhow, the garage really suits the spirit of our street wear brand… It’s not an easy entry point, it’s not on busy streets – those who will come, will come for us."

To find a garage, Vasya relied on the advice from 8rr: "Marian suggested using typed adds. We hanged up an add in three languages: ‘we will rent a garage’… First people who called us, didn’t understand what we were about to do: ‘Oh we though you need a garage to do car repair’. But then a girl called who rented us this garage. Obviously for her it’s a fun thing too…"

Volchok clothing store, 16 Saryan str. Photo by MG

Rage Garage

My girlfriends and I trough parties in the garage. We joke that before it was the guys who said: ‘We are going to hang out in the garage’ and now it’s a girls’ thing – begins Argenika her story about the Rage Garage vintage shop which she opened in December 2022. 

Argenika never engaged in vintage business before Rage Garage, though she has for long been interested in conscious consumption and environmental protection. When moving from Moscow to Yerevan in March 2022, she recalls how she in an ‘inadequate emotional state’ packed her suitcases. Upon arrival, turned out that she took only one pair of pants along with her jacked collection assembled during travelling. These jackets became the starting point for her vintage shop. Later new items were added bough in vintage shops of major international capitals, as well as jewelry and crockery made by local Armenian craftspeople.

Rage Garage vintage shop, 14 Rafael Lemkin str. Photo by MG

The garage which Argenika rents, belongs to her friends and was their warehouse for personal things: "I entered and saw complete trashiness – open soil under my feet, salt on the walls. But in the back wall there was a piece of natural basalt…The garage cluster was built neighboring a basalt quarry…From the beginning I thought that I want a counter made from natural rock, but then found out that it would be very expensive. So, I enter the garage and see this piece of basalt… Love at first site."

Argenika points that as the garage itself, the design is connected to local history. For example, old Soviet tile is used for the decoration of walls, the counter is made of pink tufa. Just like Sasha from Hummus Kimchi, she strives for better integration: "This is my personal pain. I don’t want to be a migrant project. We did several events in the garage inviting only the local businesses… On the second floor I plan a lectorium for local eco-activists… I lived in Yerevan until six, then we moved to Russia. My dad engaged only with the Armenian crowd in Russia. The lack of integration is very constraining, I know of this since childhood…"