The Moscow Metro’s most beautiful stations: ‘Komsomolskaya’ (PHOTOS)
This is the subway station that greets travelers and guests of the city arriving at three of the capital’s main railway terminals.
‘Komsomolskaya’ station on the Circle Line was opened on January 30, 1952. In the architecture of post-war USSR, the dominant style at the time was what is now called ‘Stalinist Empire’ style. It draws on classicism, antiquity, Baroque and, of course, the Empire style itself.
The station was designed by the then leading Soviet architect, Alexey Shchusev, who was also behind Vladimir Lenin's Mausoleum. The station hall is an arcade with two rows of massive columns.
‘Komsomolskaya’ was conceived as the gateway to the capital, so arriving visitors were meant to be awestruck. That is why the vaults in it are lavishly decorated with gold smalt, which gleams even brighter under the light of bronze chandeliers and ceiling lamps.
It’s believed that the chandeliers are designed in the form of ‘panicadilo’, large multi-tiered chandeliers used in Orthodox churches.
The vaults are adorned with bas-reliefs and mosaic panels depicting scenes from Russian history.
The sketches for the mosaics were made by artist Pavel Korin and all of them are connected with the triumphs of the Russian people and their military feats. They depict Alexander Nevsky, Dmitry Donskoy, Kuzma Minin and Dmitry Pozharsky, Alexander Suvorov, Mikhail Kutuzov, as well as unknown Soviet soldiers at the walls of the Reichstag.
The walls of the station, meanwhile, are faced with beige marble from Uzbekistan.
The Moscow Metro’s most beautiful stations: Ploshchad Revolyutsii (PHOTOS)
