One of Moscow's most striking churches, acknowledged as a masterpiece of world architecture, the Church of the Ascension at Kolomenskoye, is undergoing repair and restoration work until April 2025

The first stone tented church in Russia, built in the 1530s and attributed to the Italian architect Petrus Fransiscus Annibale, was founded by Vasily III as a prayer for an heir. A church of exquisite beauty!

In the second half of the twentieth century, specialists viewed the condition of the church with serious alarm: after the embankment of the Moskva River beside the church was remodelled and the springs that once flowed nearby were filled in, the bank on which the building stands, already prone to landslides, became more dangerous still for such heavy structures. From the 1970s several serious cracks appeared in the body of the church, yet the anti-landslide works were never carried out. Let us hope that present-day specialists will remove the threats to the integrity of the stone structures

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September digest: archaeological finds, exhibitions, museums, theatre and the Church

In the finale of the Strugatskys' Roadside Picnic, the Golden Ball is told: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to offend nobody, but the digest really does come free of charge. So, here is the main business of the

Frederic Leighton

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One of Moscow's most striking churches, acknowledged as a masterpiece of world architecture, the Church of the Ascension at Kolomenskoye, is undergoing repair and restoration work until April 2025

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September digest: archaeological finds, exhibitions, museums, theatre and the Church

Frederic Leighton

Attempts to resolve the problems of many years of uncontrolled mass migration

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