Exhibition of the Moscow House of Dostoyevsky

About exhibition

The exhibition is located in the northern wing of the former Mariinsky Hospital for the Poor, built in 1806 by I. Zhilyardi and A. Mikhailov to a design by Domenico Quarenghi in the style of late Russian classicism. It was here that the family of the physician M. Dostoyevsky, the father of the future writer, occupied a small apartment. Fyodor Dostoyevsky lived in the apartment on Novaya Bozhedomka, which has borne his name since 1954, from 1823 to 1837. Interestingly, the premises were never rebuilt; the walls, stoves and ceilings have been preserved as they were during the writer's lifetime. The historical interior of the apartment was recreated in 1980 based on the memoirs of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s younger brother, A. Dostoyevsky, who left a detailed description of the childhood apartment, including drawings and plans. Among the memorial items in the exhibition are an oval table placed before the sofa, a bookcase, portraits of his parents and ancestors, and bronze candelabra from A. Dostoyevsky’s collection. In the "World of Dostoyevsky" display you can see the sofa the writer purchased in 1866 during his stay in Moscow, the writing desk from the writer's last apartment, an inkstand, eyeglasses, a Gospel presented by the wives of the Decembrists in 1850, the writer's calling cards, a box of cigarette holders, and a copy of the bookcase commissioned from A. Dostoyevskaya for the F. Dostoyevsky Memorial Museum in 1913.