Greater Church of the Ascension

The church was commissioned by Prince Potemkin, the owner of a neighbouring messuage, shortly before his death.

It has been attributed either to Matvey Kazakov, who built numerous Moscow churches in the reign of Catherine the Great, or Ivan Starov, who frequently worked for Potemkin.

It was in this church that Alexander Pushkin married Natalia Goncharova, a fact commemorated by their fountain statues on Nikitskie Vorota Square.

A 17th-century tent-like belfry, the sole remnant of an earlier church on the site, was demolished in 1937[1] and replaced by a statue of Aleksey Tolstoy, the "Red Count".

The current belfry, freely based on Kazakov's designs and similar in style to the main church building, is of recent construction.