Must see attractions in Irkutsk

  • V

    Volkonsky House-Museum

    The duck-egg-blue and white home of Decembrist Count Sergei Volkonsky, whose wife Maria Volkonskaya cuts the main figure in Christine Sutherland’s…

  • Z

    Znamensky Monastery

    Stranded on the wrong side of a thundering roundabout, the 1762 Znamensky Monastery is 1.9km northeast of Skver Kirova. Echoing with mellifluous plainsong…

  • 1

    130 Kvartal

    What does a city boasting some of Siberia’s most impressive original timber architecture do to improve the visitor experience? Yes, that’s right, recreate…

  • T

    Trubetskoy House-Museum

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

  • U

    Usadba Sukacheva

    A small park on the edge of the historical centre contains a smattering of beautiful wood-lace buildings and arbours. These house exhibitions dedicated to…

  • S

    Sculpture Gallery

    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…

  • B

    Bronshteyn Gallery

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

  • S

    Statue of Tsar Alexander III

    Adorning the Angara embankment, a recast statue of Alexander III (a copy of the 1904 original) has the only tsar ever to visit Siberia looking as though…

  • M

    Museum of City Life

    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…

  • R

    Regional Museum

    Irkutsk’s rapidly ageing Regional Museum occupies a fancy 1880s brick building that formerly housed the Siberian Geographical Society, a club of Victorian…

  • B

    Bogoyavlensky Cathedral

    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…

  • S

    Sukachev Regional Art Museum

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

  • R

    Raising of the Cross Church

    The 1758 baroque Raising of the Cross Church has a fine interior of gilt-edged icons and examples of intricate brickwork in a rounded style that’s unique…

  • S

    Saviour’s Church

    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…

  • C

    City History Museum

    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…

  • A

    Angara Dam

    Some 6km southeast of the centre, the 1956 Angara Dam is 2km long. Its construction raised Lake Baikal by up to 1m and caused environmental problems, most…

  • A

    Angara Icebreaker

    Originally imported in kit form from Newcastle-upon-Tyne to carry Trans-Siberian Railway passengers across Lake Baikal (the trains went on her bigger…

  • K

    Kazansky Church

    The gigantic Kazansky Church is a theme-park-esque confection of salmon-pink walls and fluoro turquoise domes topped with gold baubled crosses. Get off…