The manor of Mariupol City Council’s mayor, having more than 150 years of history behind. Its architecture incorporated elements of the Stalinist Empire, Neoclassicism, and Baroque.
Mariupol saw rapid growth in the second half of the 19th century. Not everyone could afford a house on the main street of this seaside town. In the late 19th century, Illia Yuriev purchased a house in the city centre, a two-storey residential building on Katerynynska Street (today, 40 Myru Street). He was a respected member of the community, a lawyer at the district court, the City Duma’s chairman since March 1907, the district school board’s member, and a trustee of the city elementary school named after Metropolitan Ignatius.
Yuriev rented out the ground floor of his estate, and the editorial office of one of the city’s first periodicals, ‘Mariupol Reference Leaflet,’ started operating there. This editorial office was replaced in 1912 by ‘The 20th Century’ cinema hall. However, the Bolsheviks shut it down in the 1920s as soon as they took over Ukraine. They nationalised Yuriev’s house, first opening an orphanage there before turning it into a branch of the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs of the USSR, a ruthless repressive tool of the Soviet government.
The Nazis established the Gestapo headquarters here during World War II. They set fire to the lawyer’s former estate during the retreat. But after a few years, it was restored, giving the structure a more contemporary appearance. The house was expanded with a third floor, and its architecture incorporated elements of the Stalinist Empire, Neoclassicism, and Baroque.
During the Soviet era, the ground floor served as a shoe store, and the upper floors were used for administrative purposes. Following Ukraine’s independence, Yuriev’s house became residential again. A forced migrant from Donetsk who had served in the military during Russia’s war in the Donbas in 2014 opened a coffee shop with a library on the ground floor. Thanks to a grant from the UN program for business development and the significant support of many Ukrainians, the idea was put into action. Mariupol residents enjoyed coffee and observed city life in this atmospheric setting.
The city view from the 150-year-old monument’s windows has significantly darkened since the start of Russia’s large-scale invasion of Ukraine at the end of February 2022. Mariupol, once a thriving city, was now totally destroyed. Russian shelling mutilated the facades, roof, and interiors of Yuriev’s house.
The site that once held the memories of generations of Mariupol residents from various eras may now turn into a memory itself.
Formerly Palace of Culture of the Azovstal plant. The building of the former Continental hotel (1887–1910).
A unique monastery complex of the XVI–XIX centuries with natural caves.
Historical buildings reflecting the Mariupol architecture of the late XIX and early XX centuries before the Bolshevik Revolution.
Donbas Arena is the home stadium of the Ukrainian ‘Shakhtar’ football club, which became the first of the ‘elite’ category in Ukraine and in all of Eastern Europe.
An ancient building of 1902 in the Northern Art Nouveau style, which comprised under its roof the works by respected Ukrainian landscape painters, as well as world-famous marine and realist artists.
Invaluable monumental artworks, created by a group of Ukrainian monumentalists led by Alla Horska, a dissident artist and one of the Sixtiers movement’s founders. These panels incorporated elements of Ukrainian folk tradition, contemporary world trends, and Soviet art.
Formerly prospering trade and then a metallurgical centre of Ukraine that has become the symbol of the bloody Russian invasion of Ukraine and the genocide committed by the Russian army and government.
The only church in the world entirely decorated with Petrykivka paintings, an ancient style of folk Ukrainian decorative painting included in the UNESCO intangible cultural heritage.
The museum was established at the Faculty of History of Mariupol State University. It has become an important cultural and educational site bringing together students, professors, and citizens around the native land’s history.
One of the oldest and largest Ukrainian museums, which collection comprised over 180 thousand exhibits, including the monuments and artefacts of world importance.
One of the biggest steam mills in the German Mennonite colony that existed in the Donetsk region at the turn of the 20th century. Built in 1903, this mill had been feeding people of New York and all of its suburbs for decades.
The central church of the Sviatohirsk Lavra’s convent, erected in the neoclassical style with baroque elements in 2005 in the site of a stone church of 19th century dismantled by the Bolsheviks.
The house was built in the constructivist style in 1929. It has been the centre of the city’s creative life for almost a hundred years.
Former State Bank’s building, constructed at the turn of the 20th century. In 2019, this site housed the city library, which history began back in 1904. An intellectual and educational centre of the city.
A two-storey manor in the classical style with a neo-Gothic tower, built in Mariupol 125 years ago. The state was a property of respected doctors.
Part of the Sviatohirsk Lavra. All the skete’s buildings are made of massive pine trunks. The All Saints Church, the main skete’s sanctuary, used to be the biggest wooden church in Ukraine.
The Azovstal plant in Mariupol was one of the largest iron and steel producers in Europe. In 2022 it became a symbol of resistance to brutal Russian aggression and the incredible courage of Ukrainian fighters.
Educational institution with more than 140 years of history where many generations of Mariupol citizens studied.
Center of spiritual life of Muslims of Donetsk region.
Two buildings are a monument to an entire era. They were the last buildings in Mariupol designed in the Stalinist Neoclassicism style.
One of the oldest theatres in the Left-bank Ukraine.
The mosque was built in 2007 on the site of a mosque built in 1906 and destroyed by the Bolsheviks in 1936.
St. Demetrius Church dedicated to the holy martyr Demetrius of Thessaloniki is one of the oldest in the region.