Moscow in Shambles

In addition to the crippling economic effects of their recent drought and subsequent wildfires, Moscow’s architectural history is also in a state of flux. “Any sightseers embarking on a tour of Moscow's avant-garde architecture from the early 20th century had better brace themselves for a catalogue of degradation,” said arts critic Justin McGuirk in The Guardian. The Narkomfin building is crumbling and Konstantin Melnikov's Rusakov Workers' Club of 1929 has been abandoned. The only people who seem to care are the wives of Russian oligarchs such as Dasha Zhukova, wife of oil tycoon Roman Abramovich, who transformed Melnikov's Bakhmetevsky bus garage of 1927 into an art center called Garage. McGuirk, however, sees promise in the Strelka Institute of Architecture, Media and Design—a “social hotspot” that “offers a different model” for post-industrial Russia. Perhaps they should have been spying on Paris?