Monumental and imposing, the Rossiya Theatre was the largest cinema hall in Russia and Europe when it was constructed in 1961. The cinema was originally built to host the Moscow International Film Festival and to astound moviegoers from the Soviet Union and beyond. Its best-known features were its luminous glass walls and concrete staircase adorned with red carpets, on which many Soviet cinema icons walked.
After the collapse of the USSR, the Rossiya Theatre fell into disrepair. In 1997, it was bought by the Russian film company KARO Film, and renamed the Pushkinsky cinema in honour of the square in which it stands. Following an open call by architecture firm DuPont in 2011, designers and architects presented a myriad of futuristic designs to change the cinema’s cladding. For now, however, no restoration works have been carried out, and the former Rossiya Theatre, although still operating, stands as barely a shadow of its past self.
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