Why is the villa called black swan? Villa "black swan". Church of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Petrovsky Park, early 20th century

At the beginning of the twentieth century, Petrovsky Park was a nearby suburb of Moscow and a habitat for rich people, similar to the current Rublyovka. Among Peter's villas, the most famous was the Black Swan villa, built by millionaire Nikolai Ryabushinsky in 1907-1910. The architects of the building were V. Adamovich and V. Mayat (yes, the same Vladimir Mayat, famous for Soviet constructivist buildings, for example, the building of the Smolensk grocery store / Torgsin, built villas for millionaires before the revolution).

Villa "Black Swan"

Externally, Ryabushinsky's villa was noble and modest, with classical facades, and the interiors were elaborate, mainly in the Art Nouveau style, but with the imprint of the owner's tastes. Priceless collections of paintings, art and oriental porcelain, as well as unique custom-made furniture decorated with black swan emblems, made the ambience luxurious. Emblems with a swan were also on table china and silver, on Venetian glass glasses specially ordered in Italy, tablecloths, napkins and other household items. Old black and white photographs do not convey the full splendor of the villa, reflecting it only as a faint shadow...

Legends were made about revelries and orgies at Ryabushinsky’s villa in Moscow... But the owner, who loved to shock society, was haunted by misfortunes. In 1911, due to financial problems, Ryabushinsky had to sell most of his art collections. Later, in Paris, he managed to buy only a few paintings at auctions... But in 1912, a terrible fire broke out in the villa and many works were lost in the fire. Having restored the villa, Ryabushinsky lost it in one night at cards to the industrialist Leon Mantashev, who immediately decorated the “Black Swan” with his initials. However, the new owner did not have time to enjoy life in the villa... Soon the revolutionary year of 1917 came, and then the Bolshevik Cheka settled in the Black Swan villa...
On September 5, 1918, a demonstrative execution of 80 “hostages” from among the “representatives of the old regime” - former ministers, senior officials, clergymen - was carried out in Petrovsky Park...


"Black Swan" these days... With standard double-glazed windows...

So, we go to a small estate on the edge of Petrovsky Park at Naryshkinskaya Alley, 5. Anyone interested in what this haven of muses looks like now, I invite you to take a look! About the owner of the villa Nikolai Ryabushinsky -.
Already in the 19th century, Petrovsky Park became a prestigious aristocratic dacha place; the richest Muscovites built dachas here. Villa "Black Swan" was built in 1907-1910 according to the design of the famous Moscow architect V.D. Adamovich with the participation of V.M. Mayata. Basic architectural styles which Adamovich adhered to in his projects were neoclassicism and modernism. At the beginning of his career, he worked as an assistant to F.O. Shekhtel, participating in the construction of Z.G.’s mansions based on his designs. Morozova, N.V. Kuznetsov, Shekhtel's mansion in Ermolaevsky Lane. Since 1909, the architect V.M. was a co-author in many of V.D. Adamovich’s projects. Mayat, who worked in Moscow mainly in the Art Nouveau style. During Soviet times, he built several buildings in constructivist forms. Among their joint buildings in Moscow is such an architectural masterpiece as the Vtorov mansion or Spasohaus - the residence of the US Ambassador at 10 Spasopeskovsky Lane.

1. Unfortunately, now the villa looks like a “deeply restored” building with double-glazed windows, but let’s still try to imagine what it was like before. Old photographs, memories of contemporaries and publication in the friendly LiveJournal of Elena Horvatova will help with this - http://eho-2013.livejournal.com/482829.html.

2. In 1915, the villa survived a fire in which a significant part of the property was destroyed: a collection of paintings and a large number of Blue Rose paintings. The building was restored with modifications by architects V.A. Vesnin and A.G. Izmirov.

3. From the side of Naryshkinskaya Alley, the villa looked like a strict building in the neoclassical style.

4. Behind the façade of the villa were hidden bizarre interiors that amazed contemporaries.

5. A black swan decorated the pediment of the villa.

6. Having arranged luxurious receptions at the Black Swan and publishing The Golden Fleece, Ryabushinsky began to go bankrupt. Although in to a greater extent This was also facilitated by a huge card loss. According to rumors, Nikolai Pavlovich’s friend, oil industrialist Leon Mantashev, won a villa from Ryabushinsky at cards, and became its next owner. Now on the pediment there is a monogram of Leon Mantashev - LM. About Mantashev's racing stables -.

7. And before that, there were a lot of gossip and legends about the villa, which were mainly initiated by Nikolai Pavlovich himself with his eccentricities. For example, at the entrance to the garden there was a marble sarcophagus with a bronze figure of a bull, which the owner had prepared for himself.

8. The name "Black Swan" was given for a reason. All the furniture, which was made according to the owner’s special order, was decorated with a sign in the form of a black swan. The same sign was depicted on napkins, dishes, and silverware. The interiors of the house were designed by the symbolist artist, leader of the Blue Rose association Pavel Kuznetsov.

9. The garden was decorated with palm trees planted directly into the ground, the flowerbed in front of the terrace was planted with orchids, fountains were playing, peacocks and pheasants were walking around the garden, and a leopard was sitting on a chain near the dog’s kennel.

10. If you examine the building now, walking around it on the left side, you will notice that it is losing its classicism features.

11. And it acquires some modernist features in the side and courtyard facades.

12. Nearby is the Church of the Annunciation Holy Mother of God in Petrovsky Park.

15. Previously, Ryabushinsky’s guests had the opportunity to admire a magnificent art collection, which included precious porcelain vases, figurines of dragons with terrifying faces brought by the owner from Mallorca, poisoned arrows of savages from New Guinea. Let's see what we can admire now. We enter through the side entrance.

16. The interiors of the villa are completely lost, the interior space is divided into small rooms.

17. Nowadays, only the bas-relief “Leda and the Swan” based on the sculpture by B. Ammanati, mounted on the wall in the hall, has survived.

18. Previously, the interior decoration of the villa amazed Ryabushinsky’s guests with its luxury and exoticism.

19. On his estate, Nikolai Pavlovich kept a collection of paintings by European masters - Cranach, Bruegel, Poussin, as well as paintings by contemporary French and Russian artists.

Skakovaya street. Leningradsky Prospekt. Petrovsky Park. Vozdvizhenka Street

At the New Year's reception in 1910, Emperor Nicholas II, among the twenty richest people in the empire, included Alexander Ivanovich Mantashev, an oil industrialist and banker. After his death in 1911, Leon Mantashev took over his father’s business, doubling the family capital in just three years. He also gained fame in Moscow as a horse breeder, owner of the best stables and rich mansions.

HOUSE UNDER THE MONSEL "L. M."

On July 29, 1913, Moskovskaya Gazeta published information from its St. Petersburg correspondent about the races that took place in the capital of the empire:

“Today, July 28, the racing was given unusual interest by the meeting of two invincible horses of the current season - the Moscow derbist Demosthenes. Lazarevs with L.A. Grymza Mantashev, who won both Imperial prizes in Moscow and St. Petersburg. Until now, these two horses, like horses of different ages (Demosthenes - three years old, Grymza - 4 years old), have not yet met. Today they both rode for the Comparison prize. Dugan rode on Demosthenes, and Winkfield on Grymza. The Moscow derbist covered the distance of 2 versts 100 fathoms in 2 minutes 25.5 seconds. The second is Grymza. The “River-Neva” prize of 10,000 was taken by Gardefe Mantashev.”

Having congratulated the gentlemen Lazarevs on the victory of Demosthenes, the “athlete”

(athletes were then called not skiers and football players, but owners of racehorses) Leon Mantashev, a full member of the Imperial Moscow Racing Society, returned to Moscow with an unshakable desire to expand his stable and acquire new thoroughbred horses.

This thought haunted him, and in 1914, on Skakovaya Street, next to the Moscow Hippodrome on Begovaya, to the construction of which he was directly involved, according to the design of Arshak Izmirov, with the participation of the brothers Alexander and Viktor Vesnin, he laid out a stable of unprecedented luxury. The building, designed in the Viennese Baroque style, bore a heavy coat of arms with rough shells and the monogram of the owner - “L. M." The enchanting high arch with a cast-iron grille was complemented by a cute turret with a horse weathervane, around which the architects also provided a gallery with a fence. In 1916, the famous horse breeder Mantashev was already very proud of this magnificence. His stable had 200 thoroughbred horses (including derbists Galust 1914, Gray Boy 1915 and Macbeth 1916), on which world-famous jockey Winkfield, nicknamed the “Black Maestro,” and other famous riders took prizes.

It’s a pity, the horse breeder’s triumph was short-lived. The October Revolution of 1917 destroyed all his hopes and expectations: the Baku oil fields of the Mantashevs were nationalized by the new government. In 1918, leaving Russia, Leon Mantashev took with him to Europe the best horses of his stable and, of course, the jockey Winkfield.

In 1924, in Paris, Leon Mantashev's thoroughbred filly Transvaal, under the saddle of Winkfield, took the Grand Prix, winning a million francs. Her fabulous run was followed by a 100,000-strong Russian colony. IN last time Mantashev took his horse to the races in 1947.

In the 1930s, Moskommunkhoz adapted Mantashev’s stable to its needs. In less than half a century, the story with the stable will develop into something almost detective.

In 1985, the building on Skakova, which had already suffered considerably from time to time, was taken over by the State academic theater classical ballet under the leadership of Natalia Kasatkina and Vladimir Vasilev. While they were restoring the façade, part of the ensemble inexplicably disappeared: the side buildings with the stables were thoughtlessly demolished. Before the frame of the auditorium had been erected, funding for the federal facility cultural heritage was discontinued. The gigantic structure now stands as a sad symbol of unfulfilled hopes, and a completely tangled tangle of problems has arisen around the monument itself. Miracles began to happen. The building turned out to be leased to several tenants at once, including a car repair shop. Of course, all of them do not care about the monument to the history and culture of Moscow - the Mantashev Racing Stables Ensemble. Meanwhile, the theater of N. Kasatkina and V. Vasilyev rents venues from various theaters in the capital at preferential prices provided by the Moscow government.

JEWELS OF THE CORNET OF THE HUSSAR REGIMENT

Leningradsky Prospekt, house 21. According to the previous numbering, the mansion was listed at number 15 along the Petersburg tract. Even under the last emperor Russian Nicholas This second aristocratic district, famous for its rich mansions, began to be actively built up with factories and apartment buildings.

The only mansion that has survived from those times is the creation of the founder of the Moscow Architectural Society, Mikhail Bykovsky, who developed dacha projects in a variety of styles. This house appeared in 1840. Initially it belonged to the merchants Postnikovs, then to the famous Serpukhov textile workers Konshins, and only then came into the possession of Leon Mantashev’s younger brother, Joseph Alexandrovich, cornet of the Life Guards of the Grodno Hussar Regiment. The mansion was remodeled according to the designs of Fyodor Shekhtel and Adolf Erichson, the progenitors of romantic modernism in Russian architecture.

The last owner of the mansion, Joseph Mantashev, was known as an extravagant man and, for the sake of entertainment, for eight whole years, from 1892 to 1900, he gave shelter in his mansion to the then famous entertainment theater of Charles Aumont.

With the arrival of the Bolsheviks, the mansion was used as a dormitory for the Cheka - OGPU. The building was once renovated, and, according to rumors, under the floor, in the walls and even in the ceiling, like in a good adventure film, a real treasure was discovered - jewelry, dishes, weapons. They say that some of what was found then can still be seen in the Kremlin Armory.

The mansion was alternately occupied by various organizations. Air Force Engineering Academy named after. Zhukovsky used it as a hostel for its students, the district authorities used it as a house for pioneers, and at the end of the last century the Moscow Children's Fund nestled there.

VILLA “BLACK SWAN”

The Black Swan villa in Petrovsky Park was built in 1907–1910 for millionaire Nikolai Ryabushinsky by the famous Moscow architect Vladimir Adamovich. To save the family property from his spendthrift brother, his seven eminent brothers, who knew Nicholas’s riotous temperament, even established guardianship over him for five years, during which he could not dispose of his share of the inheritance. But even with all his “disadvantages”, Nikolai was known as a famous collector and collector of paintings. He even began publishing the magazine “Golden Fleece,” which completely bankrupted him.

Behind the strict façade of the villa there was an interior of refined taste. Artist Pavel Kuznetsov furnished the villa with fancy furniture stamped with a black swan, covered in brocade and silk. The fabrics he painted exuded the aromas of the East. The black swan emblem was displayed on napkins, dishes, silverware, and on glasses and glasses of the finest Venetian glass.

According to rumors, mysterious luxurious receptions were held at the villa, there was talk of some kind of Athenian nights with naked actresses, and that invited guests had the opportunity to admire the magnificent art collection of Nikolai Ryabushinsky, which included precious porcelain vases, figurines of dragons from Mallorca with terrifying faces, like and the poisoned arrows of the savages of New Guinea.

Palm trees, orchids and other exotic plants grew along the paths of the villa. There were fountains all around. Peacocks and pheasants walked across the lawn, and a leopard sat on a chain near the dog kennel. At the entrance to the garden, Nikolai Ryabushinsky erected a marble sarcophagus topped with a bronze figure of a bull. There, according to the owner of the villa, his remains were supposed to rest after death.

In 1915, there was a fire at the villa, in which the paintings of many great Russian painters were destroyed.

According to one version, the “Black Swan” was bought from the lost reveler Joseph Alexandrovich, according to another, the villa was won from him in one night at cards by Leon Alexandrovich, who at that time lived in his mansion on Vozdvizhenka, 16. Somehow no matter what, but on that house today there is the monogram of Leon Mantashev - “L.? M.”, exact copy the one that decorated his stable on Skakova.

Later, during the redevelopment, a collection of icons and paintings was discovered in one of the secret rooms and transferred to the Tretyakov Gallery.

MANSION OF THE MOROZOVS - MANTASHEVS

In the early 1890s, the cousin of textile magnate Savva Morozov, millionaire Arseny Morozov (1873 - 1908), traveled with his architect friend Viktor Mazyrin across Spain and Portugal. Fascinated by the Moorish style of the buildings there, upon returning to Moscow he expressed a desire to build something similar for himself.

On his 25th birthday, he receives a luxurious gift from his mother - a plot of land on Vozdvizhenka, on its even side. With his friend Mazyrin, they are inclined to think that the castle house should be built in the Moorish style. Having visited her son in an already rebuilt mansion in December 1899, Varvara Alekseevna Morozova said, barkingly: “Before, I was the only one who knew that you were a fool, but now all of Moscow will know!”

Morozov's mansion became the object of ridicule from Muscovites, gossip, rumors, and critical newspaper publications even during construction. Society perceived the exotic mansion with disapproval, if not hostility. Leo Tolstoy did not ignore this Moscow miracle. In his novel “Resurrection,” published in the same 1899, Prince Nekhlyudov, driving along Vozdvizhenka, reflects on the construction of “a stupid unnecessary palace for some stupid and unnecessary person,” thereby throwing a stone into Arseny Morozov’s garden.

The house, designed in a neo-Moorish style, was striking primarily with the design of the front entrance portal and the two towers on either side of it. The horseshoe-shaped opening, striking the eye with twisted columns, also surprised with the shell-shaped stucco on the towers. They reminded Arseny of a house-palace with shells in Sintra, Portugal, built in the mid-19th century. Elements of various styles were visible in the openwork cornices; some window openings were designed in a classical manner, others were distinguished by the lack of symmetry of various parts of the building, which made them similar to examples of architectural modernism. The interior was also varied. The "Knight's Hall", the front dining room, was designed in the spirit of pseudo-Gothic, and the main living room, where balls were held, was in the Empire style. In the interior decoration of the mansion, part of the interior breathed Arabic and Chinese motifs. A small hanging garden was built above the house.

However, it can be said that Arseny Morozov, a spendthrift and reveler to match Nikolai Ryabushinsky, was not able to enjoy life in this exotic mansion: in 1908, in a desire to prove that a person can withstand any pain, Arseny shot himself in the leg on a dare. Blood poisoning began, from which he died after three days.

The litigation for the mansion between Varvara Alekseevna and Arseny’s mistress, to whom he bequeathed it, dragged on for more than one year. In the end, the mansion went to Leon Mantashev. However, due to circumstances already known to us, he was not destined to enjoy this miracle of Moscow architecture.

In 1917, immediately after the overthrow of the tsar, the mansion was occupied by anarchists as the party headquarters. Soon, due to their disagreements with the Bolsheviks, the anarchists were evicted from the mansion, and in May 1918 the troupe of the First Workers' Theater of Proletkult moved to 16 Vozdvizhenka. The theater occupied the building for about ten years, after which the mansion was transferred to the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs. Until 1940, it housed the Japanese Embassy, ​​and during the Second World War it housed the editorial office of the English newspaper The British Ally. In the early 50s, the mansion was occupied by the Indian Embassy. At the end of the 50s, the “Union of Soviet Societies for Friendship and Cultural Relations with the Peoples of Foreign Countries” settled in the castle house, which was popularly called the “House of Friendship of Peoples.” Currently, the mansion serves as the Reception House for the Government of the Russian Federation.

The Mantashevs, persecuted by the Bolsheviks, were willingly sheltered by riotous Paris, ruining them completely. Perhaps the most scathing description of Leon Mantashev of those times in his novel “Emigrants” was given by his close friend Alexei Tolstoy: “An oil tycoon, a spendthrift of millions who clung to him without any effort, it seemed, on his part, a man with unexpected fantasies, a horseman, tall handsome man. He occupied an apartment in one of the most expensive hotels - the Carlton on the Champs-Elysees, and only this circumstance still supported his credit in small accounting offices, restaurants, and tailors.”

Joseph Mantashev passed away sometime in the 1940s in the capital of France, ending his days behind the wheel of a taxi. His older brother, Leon Mantashev, also died while driving a taxi. This happened in 1954, and also in Paris.

Marina and Hamlet Mirzoyan

I decided in my spare time to study the history of the area in which I have been living for a long time, to see the sights that you have been walking past for years, not paying attention to them, and sometimes not even suspecting that they are something significant. Enlighten yourself, so to speak, and become cultured. Well, at the same time, just take a walk around the city and the park, enjoy the last warm days.

For those who are especially curious, I will place the history of the Belorusskaya-Dynamo-Airport district in the comments to this post; posting it here would be simply indecent - there is already too much text. Well, our walk began on Leningradsky Prospekt, from the Bolshevik factory.

French gingerbread . The building of the Bolshevik confectionery factory, formerly the factory of A. Siu and K.

The factory was founded in 1855, in the basement of Vargin’s house on Tverskaya. There, the French entrepreneur Adolphe Siou and his wife, together with an employee and a student, open their own production - a confectionery. Upstairs there is a coffee shop. The business slowly grew, and in 1884 Siu and his sons, to whom management of the family enterprise passed, acquired a plot of land from the merchant Teresa Gurney behind the Tverskaya Zastava, where he built new factory. It immediately amazed the inhabitants of the capital - it was the first building in the city, completely illuminated by electric light, Lodygin's bulbs. The factory will be equipped with last word progress. Here, for the first time in Russia, mechanized chocolate production is being introduced. Refrigeration compressors, all kinds of kneading, crushing and other machines are being introduced. Even for baking ordinary Russian gingerbread (national flavor in the service of excess profits), a special rotating oven was purchased. In 1905, in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the business, employees of the Siu company solemnly presented their owners with an album with a rather flattering title: “What have you done for us.” A few months later, the workers enthusiastically joined the December armed uprising. In 1913, in recognition high quality products, confectionery factory of the partnership "A. Sioux & Co. was awarded the Highest Award with the title “Supplier of the Court of His Imperial Majesty.” In the same year, in honor of the 300th anniversary of the House of Romanov, the factory produces Yubileiny cookies. In 1924, after the factory "A. Sioux and Co. "and receives a new name - "Bolshevik", in memory of the active participation of its workers in revolutionary events.

Restaurant "Yar" and hotel "Sovetsky".

The legendary restaurant "Yar" - the brainchild of the French chef Mr. Tranquil Yard - at first, on January 1, 1826, was located in the house of the merchant Chavannes on the corner Kuznetsky Most and Neglinnaya. It soon became extremely popular among gourmets, who loved Yar for its exquisite menu and excellent wine cellars. One of the regulars at Yar on Kuznetsky was Alexander Pushkin, who captured the memory of the restaurant in one of his works.
Later - from 1848 to 1851. — “Yar” worked in the Hermitage garden, but not in the Hermitage garden on Petrovka, which we all know well, but in the old one on Bozhedomka. But it soon opened as a country restaurant in Petrovsky Park, on the Petersburg Highway, in the possession of General Bashilov, who rented out his estate for a restaurant. The fact is that for the purity of morals, gypsies were forbidden to sing in city restaurants, and behind the outposts they had every right to perform. Merchants and young people, squandering their father's fortunes, sometimes organized crazy festivities at Yar and often simply destroyed the restaurant premises, but these facts, not entirely decent for a respectable establishment, did not discourage other audiences from it. Bryusov, Chekhov, Kuprin, Chaliapin, Stanislavsky, Gilyarovsky, artists, writers, lawyers often came to Yar...
In 1895, Yar was acquired by Alexey Akimovich Sudakov, a Yaroslavl peasant who achieved everything with his mind and talent. Sudakov, who agreed with the management of a nearby hippodrome on mutual customer service. The proceeds from this brilliant idea made it possible to rebuild the restaurant. In 1910, he rebuilt “Yar” (architect A. Erichson): from a wooden house, the restaurant turned into a solid palace with columns, with a summer garden with 250 seats, a fountain, stone grottoes and gazebos covered with ivy. Houses for employees were built next to the restaurant.

The restaurant in 1910 was valued at 10 million rubles in gold, a huge figure. The restaurant with its service buildings occupied an entire block, the restaurant had its own power plant, its own water pumping station, a car park, its own stables, a summer veranda, flower beds, the back of the property was framed by “mountains” - made of stones brought from the Caucasus

The house to the right of the Sovetsky Hotel building is a house for restaurant employees. Previously, its side bay window tower was decorated with a spire. To the left of the restaurant (approximately at the site of the current junction with the Third Transport Ring) was the house of Sudakov himself; unfortunately, it has not survived.

In pre-revolutionary times, "Yar" became famous for the revelry so colorfully described by Gilyarovsky. One of the regulars at Yar was Savva Morozov. One winter he went to his favorite restaurant (this was before it was rebuilt), but they didn’t let him in - some merchant was walking around - he rented the restaurant “at the mercy”. Savva tried to be indignant, saying that he was a regular customer, he left a lot of money here, but they still refused to let him into the restaurant. Then the angry Morozov went to Petrovsky Park, picked up some stuff there, brought him to a restaurant and ordered him to break the wall so that he could drive through it into the restaurant in a straight three. The wall is being broken down, Savva Timofeevich is sitting in the troika, waiting. He does not give in to persuasion. I don't want to call the police either - I'm a regular customer. Somehow the gypsy woman from the choir persuaded him not to destroy the restaurant: “Dear father, what are you doing, we will be left without income,” in general, they persuaded him, he paid off all the “burglars,” gave up on everything and left.
The famous millionaire Khludov came to Yar accompanied by a tame tigress.
And the merchants also liked to play in the “aquarium”. They ordered water to be poured into a huge white piano to the brim and fish were thrown into it.
There was also a price list at Yar for those who like to indulge. The pleasure of smearing a waiter's face with mustard, for example, cost 120 rubles, and throwing a bottle at a Venetian mirror cost 100 rubles. However, all the restaurant’s property was insured for a substantial amount of money.
"Yar" was visited by Grigory Rasputin and Felix Yusupov, Chekhov and Kuprin, Gorky and Leonid Andreev, Balmont and Bryusov, Chaliapin, artists the Vasnetsov brothers, Levitan, Repin, Vrubel, Serov...
After the revolution, the restaurant was closed, stucco was torn from the ceilings, the fountain and garden were destroyed, and the restaurant's property was taken away. Sudakov was arrested. The fate of the owner of Yar is tragic - after the revolution, he and his children were often arrested, the Central Committee was summoned, they were regularly “shaken”, considering him the owner of a huge fortune, he could not emigrate abroad. Later Sudakov worked a simple accountant in an ordinary Soviet office. He went to live out his life in the village. He didn’t like to talk about “Yar”; this topic was closed to him. After his death, he was allegedly buried in Moscow at the Vagankovskoye cemetery. Such is the rise and fall of the owner of "Yar", who began his career as a "boy" in a tea shop, achieved everything with his work, intelligence and talent, turned the iconic restaurant into almost an empire, and ended up as an ordinary employee in a government organization...
Until 1952, the building of the former restaurant housed a cinema, a gym for Red Army soldiers, a hospital, a film college, VGIK and the Pilot's House. In 1952, a hotel complex in the Russian Empire style was added to the building of the Yar restaurant, on the personal instructions of Stalin. Now the former building looks almost unrecognizable, only the arched windows can identify the Sudak Yar. "Yar" was renamed into the "Sovetsky" restaurant. A little later, the gypsy theater "Romen" moved in next to the hotel - the spirit of the old "Yar" and Anna Zakharovna's gypsy choir turned out to be attractive.
The Sovetsky restaurant became widely known as a “restaurant for the privileged” - diplomats, party leaders and associates. During these years, “Soviet” was repeatedly awarded with pennants and honorary awards. Vasily Stalin, the King of Spain Juan Carlos, Indira Gandhi, Vysotsky with Marina Vladi, and the “Iron Lady” with Konrad Adenauer were here.
Over time, the restaurant fell into disrepair, but since 1998 it has experienced its next rebirth under the same name - “Yar”. The restaurant was restored - the pre-revolutionary interior was completely restored, the turn-of-the-century frescoes on the ceiling and walls were put in order, the chandelier from 1912 was repaired, and the fountain in the courtyard, made according to the design of the fountain, was recreated Bolshoi Theater.

Dacha of Serpukhov manufacturers Konshins.

Under Nicholas II, the aristocratic crowd had to vacate their summer apartments adjacent to the Petersburg highway - it began to be actively built up with factories and apartment buildings. The only section of the “Nikolaevskaya Rublyovka” that has miraculously survived to this day is this mansion. It belonged to the Serpukhov textile manufacturers Konshins. The architect of the house is Fyodor Shekhtel.
The next owner of the site is Joseph Mantashev, the son of the famous oil industrialist and philanthropist Alexander Ivanovich Mantashev (Mantashyants). Coming from a noble Armenian merchant family, the son of a state councilor, Alexander Mantashev, received a good education and a good inheritance. Both were wisely invested in the business, the pinnacle of which was third place in the list of the richest oil industrialists in Russia! By the beginning of the twentieth century, Mantashev’s fortune amounted to more than ten million gold rubles, which, in terms of today’s exchange rate, is equal to approximately 110,000,000 US dollars. dollars!
The Mantashevs also had a house in Moscow. The same one we are talking about now. It is believed that the owner of the mansion was Joseph Alexandrovich. But, undoubtedly, his brother Leon was here a lot and often. A little more is known about Leon Mantashev than about his brother. It was thanks to him that in just three years after the death of his father, the capital of Al. Mantashev & Co. has exactly doubled in size! At the same time, oddly enough, Leon Sanych was a very riotous, loving person, a reveler and a rake. But, of course, very intelligent and, according to many testimonies, even fraudulent. Joseph did not lag behind his brother. They tell, for example, how Joseph Alexandrovich once won a very good collection of paintings from Ryabushinsky at cards, and out of boredom he shot at the canvases without even getting up from the couch!
In the period from 1892 to 1900, the mansion housed a country theater and an amusement park for Charles Aumont; it is not clear what events preceded this. Apparently, Mantashev agreed to this for fun.
After the revolution, the old mansion was either a NKVD dormitory, or employees of the Zhukovsky Academy lived there, and later, in 1949, the House of Pioneers was placed in it.
The building was once renovated, and according to rumors, a real treasure was found under the floor, in the walls, and even in the ceiling! Jewelry, dishes, weapons - in general, everything is like in a good adventure film. Something, they say, can still be seen in the Armory Chamber in the Kremlin.

Moscow hippodrome.

A large piece of the southern part of the Khodynsky field - 120 acres of land between the Tverskaya and Presnenskaya outposts - by decree of the Senate in 1831, was allocated for the construction of a hippodrome; it was opened on August 1, 1834 with a trot race of two horses. Almost simultaneously, the Skakovaya Hippodrome opened nearby; later both hippodromes were combined with each other to free up the territory for the sidings of the Belorussky Station.
The modern building of the hippodrome, the architect of which is Ivan Vladislavovich Zholtovsky, was built after the harvest of 1950, which destroyed all the stands.
Today the "Central Moscow Hippodrome" is a federal state unitary enterprise, located in the department of the Ministry agriculture RF. It covers an area of ​​about 42 hectares and has a carrying capacity of more than 1,200 horses per year. On the racetrack of the Moscow hippodrome, horses of racing breeds are tested every year from May to September. To entertain the public, in the intervals between horse competitions, the Center occasionally hosts camel racing, dog racing, dog sled racing, and pony competitions.

Not far from the hippodrome there are stables of Leon Mantashev.

The building in the Viennese Baroque style was built in 1914-1916 according to the design of A. Izmirov with the participation of the Vesnin brothers. In the 1930s, the Moskommunkhoz garage was located here, now the building is given over for reconstruction for the Kasatkina-Vasilev Ballet Theater.
The front building of the stables is a strange combination of typical Baroque columns, a heavy coat of arms with rough shells and the owner’s monogram - “LM”, a beautiful high arch with a cast-iron grille and a charming turret with a horse weathervane. Around the turret there is a gallery with a dilapidated fence. The theater, to which the building was handed over to be torn to pieces, destroyed the side buildings of the front building, the interior of the stables, erected some metal structures there, but since 1999 they have not really built anything.
Model of the project for the reconstruction of the Mantashev stables on Skakova for the ballet theater.

As we have already said, Leon Mantashev was one of the heirs to the fortune of his father, an oilman, he continued his father’s work and managed to double his property. In addition to the fact that Leon was a successful entrepreneur, he was also a famous horse breeder, he owned more than 200 thoroughbred horses; the world-famous jockey Winkfield, the so-called, rode Mantashev’s horses. black maestro. After the Bolshevik coup, everything went to pieces. The Baku oil fields were nationalized. Leon participated in all sorts of political projects, tried to sell his enterprises to foreign companies, and continued this business in exile (in 1918, the entire Mantashev family emigrated to France), although it was clear to everyone that he was selling air. Leon took the best thoroughbred horses and jockey Winkfield with him to Europe. His recent years life was not very simple, the former philanthropist and philanthropist had to earn extra money as a simple taxi driver. Leon Aleksandrovich Mantashev died in France in 1954.

"Openwork" house.

Built next to the Moscow hippodrome complex, on the site of one of the utility buildings. The openwork house cannot be confused with anything else - the rows of patterned concrete gratings covering the kitchen loggias immediately explain its “folk” name. Floral patterns, of two types - lattice, by the way, were cast according to sketches by the artist V. Favorsky.
The first products of Soviet industrial housing construction were not yet ugly gray, boring boxes with the same face. The architect of the house, Andrei Burov, dreamed that Soviet mass development would be not only practical, but also beautiful, and that every resident would have access to a diverse social infrastructure.
The walls of the house are moiré, marble-like in color. The building itself is low - only 6 floors. The house is quite simple in shape, deliberately “industrial”. It’s the same inside: a huge front door space with three staircases, spacious corridors. But nowhere is there any stucco, no mosaics, no precious chandeliers, familiar in the homes of the Stalinist elite; this is not a palace for the elite, but an example of a standard home for Soviet citizens. Apartments, originally designed for single-family accommodation, but emphatically not elite: with combined bathrooms and microscopic four-meter kitchens. Kitchens, however, are made small on purpose. It was assumed that food would be prepared downstairs, in the restaurant, and only heated in the kitchens. Yes, a typical Soviet house should have had its own restaurant, grocery store, and nearby a hairdresser, a nursery and a kindergarten; this was Burov’s idea of ​​social infrastructure.
The war got in the way. The house was completed in a hurry, in 1941. All basements were converted into bomb shelters. Two or three families were accommodated in small apartments at once. And when it came to mass housing construction, they settled on simpler and cheaper projects, without any frills, like openwork grilles. And large-block technology has been replaced by assembly from panels.
The Openwork House also had its own celebrities - the first apartment here was given to the writer Konstantin Simonov. Here they lived with Valentina Serova until 1949. Residents claim that it was here that “Wait for me” was written.

Continues our walk"centipede house" or "octopus house".

This is a residential building located at Begovaya Street 34. Built by architect. Meyerson and his colleagues on the eve of the 1980 Olympics in the style of brutalism. Thirteen floors rest on slender and powerful reinforced concrete supports. Their peculiarity is that they taper towards the base. Due to the tapering supports, the house seems completely unreliable, however, this is not so. The house was torn off the ground not for beauty or to test the nerves of the residents. It’s just that it stands on one of the most important streets in the city with heavy traffic, and in order to prevent exhaust gases from accumulating, they decided to raise it. A kind of window allows air to circulate freely and be quickly renewed. And the space under the building is used for parking. The residents themselves call their house a “hut on chicken legs,” and due to the abundance of supporting supports resembling tentacles, Muscovites nicknamed it the “octopus house.”
Shabby “legs”, brutal loophole windows on the staircases that emerged from the building, strange entrances, angular balconies, overlapping wall panels. Both scary and beautiful at the same time, a fascinating sight.

Actually, the main goal of our walk is Petrovsky Travel Palace.

It was built in the 1770s on the lands of the Vysokopetrovsky Monastery by architect Matvey Kazakov, by order of Catherine the Great. M.F. Kazakov skillfully combined white stone and red brick. The result was a light, almost openwork structure, which combined the techniques of Russian neo-Gothic architecture and the “Turkish” style; the palace itself was a kind of fortress - it was surrounded by powerful walls with Tuscan junk towers. Petrovsky Palace is more than 200 years old, but even now it pleases the soul and the eye. During the First World War, there was a hospital there; in the 20s, the palace was transferred to the Zhukovsky Air Force Engineering Academy. It is generally accepted that the Academy only damaged the Petrovsky Palace. In 1997, the Petrovsky Travel Palace was taken away from the academy. Now it is the Moscow Government Reception House.
The palace was originally conceived as a residence for royalty, who could rest there after a long journey from St. Petersburg and proceed to the Moscow Kremlin with special pomp. The walls of the palace saw not only Russian tsars; during the War of 1812, after the start of the great fire in Moscow and the hasty withdrawal of French units, Emperor Napoleon for some time kept his headquarters in Travel Palace.. With the departure of the French, the palace was partially destroyed, but later restored.
In 1827, it was decided to turn the area near the Petrovsky Palace into a landscape park. For this purpose, the dachas surrounding the palace and the adjacent Maslova Heath were purchased. The construction was supervised by General and Senator A. A. Bashilov (the same one who later handed over his country house under the restaurant "Yar"). According to the design of the architect A. A. Menelas, a pond and a special ditch were dug to supply water from the “Butyrka swamp”, two dams were erected, and the first trees were planted (oaks, larches, maples, lindens). Bridges were made near the pond, with pedestrian paths leading to them. Initially the park covered an area of ​​94 hectares.
The park gradually began to play a prominent role in the cultural life of the city. It became a favorite place for celebrations of the Moscow aristocracy and intelligentsia; Pushkin, Lermontov, Aksakov and others were here famous people. Here the rich, merchants, industrialists and other new capitalist nobility began to build villas - they brought their entertainment here in the form of restaurants with gypsy choirs and revelries. Yar was the first of all to settle near Petrovsky Park. It was most popular among the merchants; later the next most famous ones appeared, “Strelna” and “Mauritania”, “Eldorado” and “Apollo”. Later, the aristocrats began to be crowded out by a simpler public - townspeople, peasants and, most importantly, merchants of all stripes. So in the summer, rulers went to Petrovsky Park, in the winter sleighs with a conductor, and in 1899 the first electric tram went here from Strastnaya Square, so many people wanted to walk in Petrovsky Park and live here in their dachas. Shortly before the revolution, there was even a project to build a ground metro line here.
In the twentieth century, the park was tirelessly trimmed and dismembered; a fairly large “piece” of it went under the Dynamo stadium. Most of what remains is located behind the palace and to the left of the stadium. In the park there are areas of very dense planting; due to the thick shade, not only undergrowth, but even grass does not grow under them. And there are lawns with flower beds and benches and just rare mighty trees in the middle of the clearing. For example, there is the famous Batya oak, on which there used to be a sign about its uniqueness and age, but then, as is usual with us, it was broken and not restored, and now few people guess what iconic tree he walks past in this area.

We walk along one of the alleys of the park - Naryshkinskaya. appears before us Church of the Annunciation. Now she and her territory are still under reconstruction, everything has been dug up and dug up.

Local dacha owner Anna Dmitrievna Naryshkina (the alley is named after her) founded the Annunciation Church here in the first half of XIX century. Here, at the dacha in Petrovsky Park, her thirteen-year-old granddaughter Anna Bulgari died, and before that she buried her only daughter, Countess Maria Bulgari. The woman, in grief, vowed to build a church at the site of the girl’s death. The location for the temple was very suitable for its potential parishioners. Even earlier, the caretaker of the Petrovsky Palace reported that local summer residents would like to have their own parish church here.
The church was built by Fyodor Richter, whom we know better not so much as an original architect, but as a talented restorer. The temple was consecrated in 1847.
In the 30s, the temple was closed and dilapidated. Looks like it was used for storage. Divine services resumed in 1991.

The famous villa of Nikolai Ryabushinsky has survived to this day. Black swan", built by architect. V. Adamovich and V. Mayat in 1907-1910 in the style of neoclassicism.

Nikolai Ryabushinsky is a famous figure. The man loved and knew how to live on a grand scale. The most unlucky of the 8 famous brothers and a spendthrift, who squandered his considerable fortune even before the revolution. Saving their factories from their revelry brother, and at the same time the remnants of his fortune, the brothers even established guardianship over him for 5 years, during which he had no right to dispose of his part of the inheritance. But at the same time, Nikolai was a philanthropist and collector who had good artistic taste for an amateur. The creator of the magazine “Golden Fleece” (it is believed that it was this enterprise that ultimately ruined him) and the initiator of the exhibition “Blue Rose”.
“Black Swan” was built after “Nikolasha” settled down, sold his shares in his father’s factories to his brothers, and guardianship over him was lifted. There were a lot of rumors around the villa, which were initiated by Nikolai Pavlovich himself; he knew how to shock the public, eager for gossip.
Behind the austere facade of the villa was hidden an exquisite interior: fancy furniture, made to special order, with a stamp in the form of a black swan, covered in brocade and silk and soaked in fragrant incense, beautiful paintings made by the artist Pavel Kuznetsov. The same black swan emblem was depicted on napkins, dishes, silverware, glasses and shot glasses made of the finest Venetian glass, made in Italy by order of the owner of the villa... The paths of the villa were planted with palm trees, orchids and other exotic plants. Fountains flowed. Peacocks and pheasants walked majestically between the trees, and a leopard sat on a chain near a dog's kennel. At the entrance to the garden, a marble sarcophagus was erected, topped with a bronze figure of a bull - here the remains of the owner were supposed to rest after his death.
The villa hosted luxurious exotic receptions. There were rumors about some Athenian nights with naked actresses. But the guests also had the opportunity to admire the magnificent art collection of Nikolai Ryabushinsky, which included precious porcelain vases, figurines of dragons with terrifying faces brought by the owner from Mallorca, poisoned arrows of savages from New Guinea. And, of course, a collection of paintings, both by old masters and young artists, and icons, which after the revolution will go to the halls of the Tretyakov Gallery.
In 1911, due to financial problems, Ryabushinsky sold part of his collection at auction. Nikolai Pavlovich subsequently managed to buy some of his paintings abroad. He decided to preserve the paintings by Russian masters of the early 20th century. But in the Black Swan estate, where they were stored, there was a fire in 1915 that destroyed many of the great paintings Russian painters. In the end, Nikolai Pavlovich’s financial affairs were completely upset. The "wasteful brother" was also crushed by his hobby card game. The second owner of the villa was Leon Mantashev, already known to us. According to rumors, he beat Ryabushinsky's "Black Swan" at cards in one night. The building still bears the monogram of Leon Mantashev - LM, similar to the one on the coat of arms of his stables.
After the revolution, the Black Swan building was occupied by the regional Cheka. A collection of icons by Nikolai Ryabushinsky was discovered in the house, which added to the exhibition Tretyakov Gallery.

The hussar's guiding star.

In memory of the events of the war of 1812, on the occasion of the 850th anniversary of Moscow, an obelisk to the Russian hussars was erected in the park. This obelisk is a steel spire more than 5 meters high, at the end of which is a gilded glass ball, which during the day, in the rays of the sun, will shine like a star, and at night will shine the same way, only thanks to the backlight. The design was called " Guiding Star hussar,” it was built as a symbol of the War of 1812. The work was carried out by honored artists of Russia: Nikita Medvedev, Evgeny Moiseev and German Zaryakin.

Hospital of Doctor Usoltsev.

In 1903, a psychiatrist from Kostroma F.A. Usoltsev and his wife purchased two one-story wooden outbuildings, radically rebuilt them, arranged a garden, laid walking paths and... opened a “sanatorium” for the insane.
According to the doctor’s plan, the patient did not end up in a medical institution with strict rules, but in an ordinary home - on a visit to the Usoltsev family. In the evenings, conversations and concerts were held in the living room; during the day, patients could walk freely, go about their business, and communicate with the doctor. Nothing should remind a person of the disease - this was the main principle of treatment. Very effective, by the way.
One of the patients of the hospital was the artist Mikhail Vrubel. While in the clinic, he painted several paintings, including his last work in his life - a portrait of Bryusov. Based on Vrubel's sketches, in 1910 Shekhtel created the fence of the hospital and its gates, which are now often called Fairytale Gates. By the way, there is an opinion that the Fairytale Gate was “transformed” from the gate of Ivan Morozov’s dacha, which was previously located there. » The wooden spans of the fence are decorated with blind carvings. Previously, the fence posts were decorated with majolica, but now the fence is in rather poor condition and is collapsing, especially the side turrets.
In 1930, the sanatorium was transformed into the Moscow Regional Psychoneurological Clinic, now the Central Moscow Regional Clinical Clinic psychiatric hospital.
In 2006, the famous fence was almost disfigured; some of the wooden spans were replaced with metal sheets. According to the hospital management, the work to replace the wooden fence was carried out in order to strengthen anti-terrorist security measures. Fortunately, a fuss began among journalists and the innovations were stopped. They promised to restore the lost wooden fence along the street on March 8th.

Restaurant Eldorado.

Mr. Skalkin had a beautiful tenor voice. At first he sang in restaurants himself, then he formed his own choir, worked for many years with his artists in the Golden Anchor restaurant, and in 1899 acquired his own restaurant, Eldorado, in Petrovsky Park.
It was a small wooden house, but furnished with a certain amount of grace. The gypsy Varya Panina, a famous singer, performed at Skalkin’s. People came here to watch Sasha Artamonova’s fiery dances. The profits from the restaurant did not take long to arrive. And already in 1908, Skalkin was rebuilding a new building, according to the design on which N.D. Polikarpov and L.N. Kekushev worked. Kekushev designed all the metal “decorations”: flag holders, floor lamps, fencing. The halls contained the most expensive furniture, made to special order at V. Smirnov’s artistic furniture factory
The restaurant had a winter garden, furnished with tropical plants, with singing canaries that lived in this garden, sang and flew freely. And in the same garden there were wonderfully decorated, comfortable offices. A large stage was set up in the garden, on which harpists, songwriters and chansonnets performed.
In the mid-1920s, the House of Officers was located here. Local youth came here to dance. Apparently, in memory of the former restaurateur, the invitation to dance sounded like: “Shall we go to Skalkin’s?” :)
Several years ago, the House of Officers was evicted from there, and the building was put on the block. repair. Now the metallurgical company Mechel has settled in the building, and the building was renovated using its funds.

I would also like to tell you about Khodynka field. Once upon a time, the Khodynka field was a vast sandy area crossed by ravines and the Khodynka and Tarakanovka rivers. Khodynskoe field has a long history. It was first mentioned under the name Khodynsky Meadow in 1389, when Dmitry Donskoy bequeathed the Khodynsky Meadow near Moscow to his son Yuri Dmitrievich. For a long time The field remained undeveloped; the arable land of the coachmen of Tverskaya Sloboda was located on it. Under Catherine II, in 1775, a grandiose folk festival was held on Khodynka to mark the end of the war with Turkey and the conclusion of the Kyuchuk-Kainardzhi Peace, which was very beneficial for Russia. Subsequently, Khodynskoye Field was repeatedly used for mass festivities.
At the beginning of the 20th century. An airfield and an air park were built on Khodynskoye Field. The first flights in Moscow took place over the hippodrome. In the fall of 1909, French aviators Leganier and Guyot demonstrated “flight” in a circle at a height of 15 m above the treadmill. The unimaginable was happening in the stands: applause and screams drowned out the noise of the engine. In the summer of 1910, construction of an airfield began on Khodynskoye Field.
The grand opening of the Khodynka airfield took place on October 3, 1910 (later called the Frunze Central Airfield). On that day, the first to speak here was the millionaire aviator from Kiev, Mikhail Scipio del Campo (his father bought such a sonorous Italian surname and at the same time the title of count). Following him on Khodynka, almost all the aviators then available in Russia showed their skills - Rossinsky, Utochkin, Efimov.
In 1922, the first international air flights in Russian history began to operate from the Central Airfield on Khodynka. In 1923, the first regular domestic passenger flights began.
In 1931, the first air terminal building in the USSR was opened at the airfield, and in 1938 a metro line with a station of the same name was connected to the airport.
In 2003, the airfield was closed, and the remains were runway abandoned aircraft are located. In the future, it is planned to organize the “Aviation Museum on Khodynskoye Field” at this location.

So, we go to a small estate on the edge of Petrovsky Park at Naryshkinskaya Alley, 5. Anyone interested in what this haven of muses looks like now, I invite you to take a look! About the owner of the villa Nikolai Ryabushinsky - in the previous publication.
Already in the 19th century, Petrovsky Park became a prestigious aristocratic dacha place; the richest Muscovites built dachas here. Villa "Black Swan" was built in 1907-1910 according to the design of the famous Moscow architect V.D. Adamovich with the participation of V.M. Mayata. The main architectural styles that Adamovich adhered to in his projects were neoclassicism and modernism. At the beginning of his career, he worked as an assistant to F.O. Shekhtel, participating in the construction of Z.G.’s mansions based on his designs. Morozova, N.V. Kuznetsov, Shekhtel's mansion in Ermolaevsky Lane. Since 1909, the architect V.M. was a co-author in many of V.D. Adamovich’s projects. Mayat, who worked in Moscow mainly in the Art Nouveau style. During Soviet times, he built several buildings in constructivist forms. Among their joint buildings in Moscow is such an architectural masterpiece as the Vtorov mansion or Spasohaus - the residence of the US Ambassador at 10 Spasopeskovsky Lane.

1. Unfortunately, now the villa looks like a “deeply restored” building with double-glazed windows, but let’s still try to imagine what it was like before. Old photographs, memories of contemporaries and publication in the friendly LiveJournal of Elena Horvatova will help with this - http://eho-2013.livejournal.com/482829.html.

2. In 1915, the villa survived a fire in which a significant part of the property was destroyed: a collection of paintings and a large number of Blue Rose paintings. The building was restored with modifications by architects V.A. Vesnin and A.G. Izmirov.

3. From the side of Naryshkinskaya Alley, the villa looked like a strict building in the neoclassical style.

4. Behind the façade of the villa were hidden bizarre interiors that amazed contemporaries.

5. A black swan decorated the pediment of the villa.

6. Having arranged luxurious receptions at the Black Swan and publishing The Golden Fleece, Ryabushinsky began to go bankrupt. Although this was largely due to the huge card loss. According to rumors, Nikolai Pavlovich’s friend, oil industrialist Leon Mantashev, won a villa from Ryabushinsky at cards, and became its next owner. Now on the pediment there is a monogram of Leon Mantashev - LM. About Mantashev's racing stables - http://galik-123.livejournal.com/149069.html.

7. And before that, there were a lot of gossip and legends about the villa, which were mainly initiated by Nikolai Pavlovich himself with his eccentricities. For example, at the entrance to the garden there was a marble sarcophagus with a bronze figure of a bull, which the owner had prepared for himself.

8. The name "Black Swan" was given for a reason. All the furniture, which was made according to the owner’s special order, was decorated with a sign in the form of a black swan. The same sign was depicted on napkins, dishes, and silverware. The interiors of the house were designed by the symbolist artist, leader of the Blue Rose association Pavel Kuznetsov.

9. The garden was decorated with palm trees planted directly into the ground, the flowerbed in front of the terrace was planted with orchids, fountains were playing, peacocks and pheasants were walking around the garden, and a leopard was sitting on a chain near the dog’s kennel.

10. If you examine the building now, walking around it on the left side, you will notice that it is losing its classicism features.

11. And it acquires some modernist features in the side and courtyard facades.

12. Nearby is the Church of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Petrovsky Park.

15. Previously, Ryabushinsky’s guests had the opportunity to admire a magnificent art collection, which included precious porcelain vases, figurines of dragons with terrifying faces brought by the owner from Mallorca, poisoned arrows of savages from New Guinea. Let's see what we can admire now. We enter through the side entrance.

16. The interiors of the villa are completely lost, the interior space is divided into small rooms.

17. Nowadays, only the bas-relief “Leda and the Swan” based on the sculpture by B. Ammanati, mounted on the wall in the hall, has survived.

18. Previously, the interior decoration of the villa amazed Ryabushinsky’s guests with its luxury and exoticism.