Belaya Vorona

Top choice in Irkutsk


Disciples of the bean should definitely head to the ‘White Crow’, a relaxing cellar-based coffee hang-out hiding from view in the cellar of a flower shop on the main drag. A funky soundtrack provides background for caffeine or a late breakfast as you catch up on emails or browse in the small book exchange, wishing you could read the Cyrillic paperbacks.


Lonely Planet's must-see attractions

Nearby Irkutsk attractions

1. Sculpture Gallery

0.36 MILES

Opened in 2016, this lovely gallery puts in the spotlight Russian and Soviet sculpture previously kept in the city's main art museum and private…

2. City History Museum

0.38 MILES

Despite its palatial 19th-century home (built by wealthy merchant Sibiryakov in 1884), what should be Irkutsk's main repository of the past is in fact a…

3. Sukachev Regional Art Museum

0.42 MILES

The grand old art museum has a valuable though poorly lit collection ranging from Mongolian thangkas (Tibetan Buddhist religious paintings) to Russian…

4. Saviour’s Church

0.49 MILES

Constructed in 1706, this is the oldest stone-built church in Eastern Siberia and has remnants of the original murals on its facade. Until the late 1990s…

5. Bogoyavlensky Cathedral

0.5 MILES

This fairytale ensemble of mini onion domes atop restored salmon, white and green towers first appeared on the Irkutsk skyline in 1718, but during the…

6. Trubetskoy House-Museum

0.5 MILES

Irkutsk’s second Decembrist house-museum emerged from a recent renovation with English-language information, touchscreens and tinkling background music…

7. Bronshteyn Gallery

0.57 MILES

A large and sparkling new modern-art venue that most prominently features a collection of Dashi Namdakov’s sculptures inspired by Buddhist prayer dolls…

8. Museum of City Life

0.6 MILES

This small museum filling six rooms of a former merchant’s house illustrates just why 19th-century Irkutsk was nicknamed the ‘Paris of Siberia’. Changing…