Jake Borden

Twenty-five years after the fall of the USSR, many people struggling to find a home and a job in the former Soviet republic of Georgia have made their home in abandoned buildings. 

Some are refugees from Abkhazia, a Georgian region which fought a war of secession in 1992-93. A quarter of a million people were internally displaced in the conflict. Others became homeless after simply falling on hard times.

In Ruins
A man looks out the 7th door of a former Soviet military hospital, now is home.
Murals
A woman stands in the apartment she converted when moving to Tbilisi. Her two children are at seminary school, and painted the mural before leaving.
Conch Shell
A conch shell serves as home to a lone minnow in a unit converted by residents.
Curtains
A woman holds an ax she used to chop heating wood for her home.
4pm
A man sleeps in the afternoon light drifting through the window, after sharing a traditional Georgian meal with a traveling photographer.
Abkhaz
A woman stands in her home that she shares with her extended family after being forced to leave Abkhazia.
Girl in Window
A girl peers out the window of her bedroom which she shares with her three siblings.
Home
A man raises his hands in anguish after describing having to leave his home in Abkhazia when Russian forces invaded.
Room
A woman clears a room which she will convert into an apartment for her and her family.
Hospital
A view of the former Soviet hospital that is now home to over 400 Abkhaz refugees in Tbilisi.
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