House of the Unions

Stand on the pavement here and let the traffic of central Moscow wash past you. Cars hiss along the wide avenue. Pedestrians hurry toward the metro. And in front of you rises a long, pale green and white facade, calm and orderly, with a row of columns standing quietly above the street. It does not shout for attention. Yet few buildings in this city have seen so much: glittering balls, grand concerts, state funerals, and some of the darkest trials of the twentieth century.

This is the House of the Unions. It sits at the corner where Bolshaya Dmitrovka Street meets Okhotny Ryad, a few minutes' walk from the Kremlin walls and the Bolshoi Theatre. The name is Soviet, but the building is much older than the Soviet state. To understand it, you have to imagine this corner more than two centuries ago, when it belonged to the Russian aristocracy rather than to the workers.

In the late eighteenth century, this was a private mansion owned by a noble family. In the 1780s, it was bought for the Moscow Noble Assembly. That was a kind of club for the hereditary nobility of the city and its province. Members gathered here to dance, to dine, to discuss local affairs, and above all to be seen. The building was reshaped for this new public life by Matvey Kazakov, one of the leading architects of Moscow in the age of Catherine the Great.

Kazakov worked in the classical style. In simple terms, that means he borrowed the language of ancient Greece and Rome: columns, symmetry, clean proportions, and calm repetition. You can still see that spirit on the exterior. The street facade was altered and enlarged in later years, so what you see today is not exactly Kazakov's original. But the sense of balance, the even rhythm of windows and columns, still follows his classical idea.

The true heart of the building is hidden inside. It is called the Hall of Columns. Picture a long, tall room lined on every side by white columns with richly carved tops. Between and above them hang crystal chandeliers. The whole space is pale and bright, designed to multiply candlelight and later electric light. Here is the first surprise for many visitors: the hall's gleaming white surfaces were made to look like marble, but much of that finish is skilled plasterwork, polished until it shines.

For the Moscow nobility, this hall was the centre of the social season. Winter balls here were famous across Russia. Young women from noble families were brought to Moscow to dance under these chandeliers, and often to find a husband. Russian novels of the nineteenth century are full of scenes in grand ballrooms like this one. When you read about a Moscow ball in Tolstoy or Pushkin, a room much like the Hall of Columns is a good picture to hold in your mind.

The building did not escape the great fire of 1812. When Napoleon's army occupied Moscow that autumn, much of the city burned, and this house was badly damaged. It was restored in the years that followed. The ballroom returned to life, and the balls returned with it. In a way, the building's history is a story of repeated survival. Fire, revolution, and war all passed through these doors, and the white hall came back each time.

The Hall of Columns was also known for its sound. Through the nineteenth century, it became one of the most important concert halls in Moscow. Great composers and visiting virtuosos performed here, and Russian audiences heard major works in this room. Musicians still praise its acoustics today. So if you ever hear an orchestra inside, remember that the music rises into the same space that carried the music of the imperial age.

Then came 1917. After the revolution, the nobility lost its privileges, and its club lost its purpose. The building was handed to the trade unions, which is where the name House of the Unions comes from. The aristocrats' ballroom became a hall for congresses, meetings, and Soviet ceremonies. The same columns that once framed waltzing couples now framed red banners and speakers' platforms. It is hard to imagine a sharper change of audience in a single room.

Here is the second surprise, and it is a sombre one. In January 1924, Vladimir Lenin lay in state in the Hall of Columns. Huge crowds queued in the bitter winter cold to file past his coffin. Nearly three decades later, in March 1953, Joseph Stalin lay in state here too. The crowds that pushed toward this building in those days were so dense that many people died in the crush on the surrounding streets. The building became the place where the Soviet state said goodbye to its leaders.

The darkest chapter came in the late 1930s. Several of the Moscow show trials, the public trials staged during Stalin's Great Terror, were held inside this building. Leading figures of the revolution stood accused of crimes they almost certainly did not commit. Many confessed under pressure and were later executed. It is a painful contrast. The rooms built for dancing and music were used for theatre of a very different kind, where the verdict was written before the performance began.

In later decades, the building found gentler work again. It hosted concerts, official events, and even world chess championship matches, when millions of people followed every move played in this hall. Today it is still used for concerts, exhibitions, and public events. Access to the interior depends on what is happening inside, so many visitors only see the facade. Even so, standing here and knowing what lies behind those walls changes how the building looks.

Before you move on, look once more at the facade. Notice how quiet it is next to the heavy Soviet buildings nearby. Listen to the traffic on Okhotny Ryad, the same street where crowds once stood for hours in the cold. Then think of the white hall inside, with its chandeliers, holding all of it at once: the waltz, the symphony, the funeral, the trial. As you walk toward the Bolshoi or the Kremlin, carry that one room with you.