CHIȘINĂUSocialist Architecture · 1950–1990

Chișinău was rebuilt twice — after the earthquake of 1940 and again after the destruction of the Second World War — and what stands today is largely the work of Soviet architects planning the capital of the Moldavian SSR. Wide axial boulevards, government buildings in stripped classicism, and from the 1960s onward a more confident modernism: the State Circus, Hotel National, the Palace of the Republic.

What sets Chișinău apart is its monumental decorative art. Soviet mosaics survive here in unusual density — on bus stops, power stations, telecom buildings, the railway station — the work of artists given licence to be ornamental within a system that generally was not. Most carry no protected status. Many have already disappeared behind advertising hoardings or insulation cladding.

Soviet architecture in Moldova receives very few visitors, which is part of what makes architecture tourism here rewarding: the mosaics, the State Circus and the government buildings can be covered in two days on foot and by trolleybus, with almost nobody else photographing them.