TsUM (Central Department Store) (Moscow)

 clothes store / boutique, Art Nouveau / Jugendstil (architecture), department store, listed building / architectural heritage, 1974_construction, 1908_construction

Tsentralniy Universalniy Magazin - Central Universal Store

Originally the Muir & Merrilees department store. Scottish business partners Andrew Muir and Archibald Merrilees set up their company in St. Petersburg in the first half of the 19th century. In the 1880s the firm relocated to Moscow where they established a wholesale shop for ladies' hats and dry goods at the corner of Kuznetsky Most, a very prestigious location. They opened their doors here at the foot of Petrovka Street in 1892.

The current building was constructed in 1908. It is an example of the European Gothic style with some modernist style elements. The seven-story building was a project of well-known architect Roman I.Klein, also the architect of «the A. S. Pushkin Museum of the Fine Arts». This building represented the first time ferro-concrete has been used in a building in Russia. The new manner of construction allowed increasing the floor space by using thinner walls, doing without traditional wide columns and using iron and steel designs for substantial increase in window space.

In 1918, Muir & Merrilees was nationalized by the Soviet government, and in 1922 the sore was renamed MosTorg, eventually becoming TsUM. In 1997, TSUM was reconstructed and expanded. In 2004 the building was again renovated.

Address: Petrovka str., 2
Phone: +7 (495) 292–1157
www.tsum.ru/english