Palace of the Soviets: plans of building a skyscraper in the capital in the 20th century

On January 28, 1957, Executive Committee of the Moscow City Council decided to build the Palace of the Soviets. Documentary evidence of this is available in the Moscow Glavarchiv.

Anatoly Lunacharsky, People's Commissar of Education of the RSFSR, was the first to express the idea of erecting a monumental building. He spoke about it at the First All-Union Congress of the Soviets held in December 1922. The idea was to “add a visible architectural center to Moscow — the red centre of the world.” But the proposal happened to come soon after the Civil War in Russia, and the grandiose construction was out of step with the times.

But the idea reappeared in 1931. Then a number of locations for the monumental architectural structure were offered, including former trading rows on Red Square, Kitay-Gorod district and Zaryadye district. But based on Stalin's personal instructions, it was decided to build the Palace of the Soviets on the site of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior — it was destroyed in December of the same year.

A contest for the best project was announced. The winner was Boris Iofan, co-authored with Vladimir Shchuko and Vladimir Gelfreich. A year later, the special Department for the construction of the Palace of the Soviets was established under the USSR Council of People's Commissars.

The process of completing the project lasted several more years, since the task was to erect the most grandiose building of the time. The structure was supposed to be about 420 meters high, including a 100-meter statue of Lenin by Sergei Merkulov. Initially, it was planned that the project would become the major construction site of the master plan for Moscow reconstruction in 1935, and would define the new historical centre of the capital. The construction began in 1937, and installation of the steel frame of the Palace of the Soviets began in early 1940s. However, during the Great Patriotic War, metal was more needed in the arms industry.

The original project was abandoned in the post-war years. Options for constructing the building were considered, but of a much smaller height. And by the mid-1950s, it became obvious that the erection of such a building in the center of Moscow was just impractical. A contest was announced in 1956 to create a new project of the Palace of the Soviets, but it was supposed to be located in the southwest of Moscow. The above-mentioned resolution of Executive Committee of the Moscow City Council was adopted on this issue.

On June 9, 1960, the Council of Ministers adopted a resolution “to recognize the necessity of finishing the construction of the Palace of the Soviets in 1967 [...] in the south-western district of Moscow in order to coincide its opening [...] with the 50th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution.” It was assumed that the development would be completed before 1962, but a government decree postponed the design and construction of the Palace of the Soviets in May 1963. The author's group was abolished, materials were handed over to the Moscow City Executive Committee. The project has never been revived.