Church of Sts. Cosmas and Damian on Maroseyka

On Maroseyka Street, within the boundaries of the old White City (Bely Gorod), stands the small but striking Church of Sts. Cosmas and Damian of Asia — until 1922 the neighboring lane branching off the street right by the church’s apse was named after it. Despite its modest size, the building remains the architectural dominant of the quarter and one of the most distinctive monuments of Moscow classicism.

A wooden church already stood on this site in the 16th century and burned down twice — in 1547 and 1629; the stone building that replaced it is mentioned in chronicles under the year 1639. The present building was erected in 1791–1793 to a design by the architect Matvei Kazakov, with finishing work completed by 1803; funds for construction were provided by the merchant Matvei Khlebnikov, whose house stood across the street. In 1893 parishioners thoroughly renovated the church at their own expense.

After the revolution the parish did not last long: the church was closed in the late 1920s, in 1929 its fence was ordered demolished to widen the roadway, and at the start of the following decade the authorities were seriously preparing to demolish the building entirely, permitting only a final measured photographic survey. The structure was saved that time, but a warehouse was set up inside and a beer hall opened at the entrance, later closed. Over various Soviet decades the former church housed a model-making workshop and a car-and-motorcycle enthusiasts’ club; in 1958 a scholarly restoration of the façades was carried out, restoring the gilded domes, though the interior remained altered. In 1972 an administrative building of dark glass and plastic rose behind the church, and a new fence was put up around it.

The return of the church to the parish took years: in 1992 the premises were temporarily handed to the library of the Academy of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, but within a year the church was finally returned to the faithful. The Soviet-era floor slabs were gradually dismantled, the historical interior volumes were restored, and the iconostases of the main chapel and side chapels were reassembled.

The building’s unusual quality lies in its very composition: four cylindrical volumes of the same height as the apse form the church’s main mass, while a cubic refectory volume and a bell tower are placed on the same longitudinal axis to the west; the side chapels are flanked by symmetrical two-column porticos. Kazakov skillfully combined circle and triangle in the plan, merging the traditional multi-altar Moscow parish church with techniques from the latest French architectural treatises of the era — for this rare sculptural unity the building is ranked among the finest examples of mature Moscow classicism.

Among the church’s parishioners over the years were the poet Fyodor Tyutchev and the writer Fyodor Dostoevsky. Today regular services are held in the church, and its silhouette remains one of the recognizable features of Maroseyka’s historic streetscape.