Main Building of Moscow State University — skyscraper
Dmitry A. Mottl · CC BY-SA 3.0

Main Building of Moscow State University

  • 2 min read
  • 55.703° N 37.531° E

Interesting facts

  • The tower clock's dial measures 8.74 metres across and was counted as the largest in Europe as of 2014.
  • The side wings carry a giant thermometer and barometer that match the clock on the central tower.
  • Floors 24 to 31 of the tower are taken up by the university's Museum of Earth Sciences.
  • The building holds 148 lecture halls, a 1,500-seat assembly hall and some 5,754 rooms for students and postgraduates.
  • Thousands of prisoners took part in the construction, and accounts describe a separate camp section for about 700 inmates on the 22nd floor.
  • Between 1951 and 1954 more than 50,000 trees and 400,000 shrubs were planted around the building.
  • The sculptor Vera Mukhina, creator of the Worker and Kolkhoz Woman, oversaw the building's sculptural decoration.
  • The assembly hall is decorated with a mosaic panel by the painter Pavel Korin.
  • It remained the tallest structure in Russia until 1967 and the tallest building in Moscow until 2003.

Why it is worth it

From the top of the Sparrow Hills a single tower rises 239 m over southwest Moscow, crowned by a spire and a five-pointed star. The main building of Moscow State University is the tallest of the Seven Sisters, the group of high-rises built in Moscow between 1947 and 1953 in the monumental Stalinist style, and when it opened in 1953 it became the tallest building in Europe, a title it held until 1990, when the Messeturm in Frankfurt overtook it. It is still described as the tallest educational building in the world.

The commission first went in 1947 to Boris Iofan, but his design placed the tower on the very edge of the Sparrow Hills escarpment, where the ground was prone to landslides, and the job was handed to Lev Rudnev. Rudnev, already known for the Frunze Military Academy, moved the building about 800 m back from the cliff; the engineering team was led by Vsevolod Nasonov. The frame consumed more than 40,000 tonnes of steel and some 130,000 cubic metres of concrete, and the building was inaugurated on 1 September 1953, the start of the academic year. Rudnev received a Stalin Prize for the design in 1949, while it was still under construction.

The composition is symmetrical and stepped. The central block has 36 levels; its roof at 182 m carries a 58 m spire ending in a star weighing about 12 tonnes. Lower towers flank it, and two wings of 18 and 9 storeys, originally dormitories, wrap around a formal courtyard in front of the main entrance. The silhouette became one of the defining images of postwar Soviet architecture: it inspired the Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw and was echoed in the emblem of the 1980 Moscow Olympics. The building was designed as the headquarters of Moscow State University, founded in 1755 and named after the scholar Mikhail Lomonosov, and it still serves the university today.

Getting there

The building stands on the Sparrow Hills in southwest Moscow, about 8 km in a straight line from the Kremlin; Universitet metro station is nearby. The nearest airport is Vnukovo International Airport (VKO), about 21 km to the southwest.

Plan your visit

We have no confirmed visit data yet. Once it is confirmed, this block also carries the date it was checked.

Nearby places

On these lists

The Most Beautiful Places in Moscow Oblast 13The Most Beautiful Places in Russia 73The Most Beautiful Buildings in Russia 6The Most Striking Skyscrapers 20The Most Beautiful Buildings 286

From the encyclopaedia

The main building of Moscow State University is a 239-metre (784 ft), 36-story skyscraper in Moscow, Russia. It was designed by Lev Rudnev as the headquarters of Moscow State University, and is the tallest among the "Seven Sisters" constructed in Moscow between 1947 and 1953 in the Stalinist architectural style.

Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

55.70306, 37.53056per Wikidata