[6] She engaged the most fashionable Russian architect, Fyodor Schechtel, to remodel the mansion in the then-current Neoclassical style, complete with a six-column Ionic portico.

On 21 January 1924, Vladimir Lenin, the first leader of the Russian SFSR and subsequently the USSR, died at this estate, which he had used as his personal dacha since its nationalization in 1918.

After the Soviet government moved to Moscow in 1918, it nationalized the luxurious estate and converted it into Vladimir Lenin's dacha.

On May 15, 1923, Lenin followed medical advice and left the Moscow Kremlin for Gorki.

Also located on the estate is a large museum built in 1987 concerning Lenin's life there, containing such artifacts as his Last Testament (as transcribed by Nadezhda Krupskaya), other documents, photos, books, Lenin's car (a Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost), his wheelchairs, and his apartment and office from the Kremlin, reconstructed in a separate building.