This In Your Pocket Guide is available as
Soviet Sights

Soviet Sights

Since Ukraine’s independence many of the once omnipresent Soviet era symbols have vanished. Ironically, Kyiv is now a mosaic of billboards, LCDs, banners and other capitalist marketing propaganda; but turn a corner, pass under an arch or over a bridge and you catch a flash of the hammer and sickle and you’re immediately transported back to the good old days of the Cold War. Love it or loath it, communism was the defining socio-political force of the 20th Century and its indelible mark survives in the Ukrainian mentality, in Kyiv’s architecture, monuments and in its soul.

Bookmark and Share

Kyiv | What to see | Soviet Sights

Metro
After 11 years of construction, Kyiv’s first metro line opened in 1960. In typical Soviet fashion, the metro was designed to be a showcase of craftsmanship, style and technological innovation for the capital of one of the largest member states of the USSR. The original metro stations in the c [...]



Add your comment

Ministry of Foreign Affairs Building
Next to St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Cathedral (destroyed by Soviet authorities in the mid-1930s and rebuilt in 2000) stands an example of grandiose Soviet era architecture, the columned Foreign Ministry building. Just beneath where the Ukrainian flag now waves, there was a large hammer and sic [...]



Add your comment

Mykhailivs’ka pl. 1

Metro station:

Maidan Nezalezhnosti
Motherland
An enormous stainless steel statue of a fierce female warrior (68 m high, standing on a 40 m pedestal and holding a 12-ton sword in her right hand and a shield in the left) dominates the heights above the Dnipro River. Giant, threatening and inescapable, the statue is known locally as ‘Brezhn [...]



Add your comment

Ivana Mazepy 44

Metro station:

Arsenal’na
The Friendship of Nations Arch
This steel rainbow was erected in 1983 to commemorate the unification of Ukraine and Russia in 1653. The monument is supposed to symbolize friendship and mutual respect between the two nations. Crowds swarm the monument’s platform to enjoy spectacular views of the Dnipro River and the vast st [...]



Add your comment

Metro station:

Maidan Nezalezhnosti
Ukrainian House (former Museum of Lenin)
In April 1982 the imposing building on European Square was completed. It was designed specifically to house a museum dedicated to Lenin. In 1992 the museum was renamed ‘Ukraine House’. All the old exhibits of the former Museum of Lenin are stored in one of the buildings in the Expocent [...]



Add your comment

Metro station:

Maidan Nezalezhnosti