[1] The property was declared a historical monument by presidential decree in 1982, and the complex was turned into the current museum and asylum institution in 1990, on the 50th anniversary of the assassination.

[2][3][4] From January 1937 to April 1939, the couple lived at Frida Kahlo's family home called “La Casa Azul” (The Blue House), which is located in the Coyoacán borough of Mexico City.

On 24 May 1940, a failed attempt on Trotsky's life was led by NKVD agent Iosif Grigulevich and Mexican painter David Alfaro Siqueiros.

Robert Sheldon Harte, a young assistant and bodyguard of Trotsky, was abducted and later murdered, but the other guards defeated the attackers.

A Spanish Stalin supporter by the name of Ramón Mercader, under the name of Jacson Mornard and with a Canadian passport, had become the lover of Trotsky's personal secretary, who was a Soviet agent.

[3] The current museum was created on 20 August 1990, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the assassination along with the Instituto del Derecho de Asilo y las Libertades Públicas (Institute for the Right of Asylum and Public Liberties).

[4] The museum receives an average of 17,000 foreign visitors each year, along with 50,000 students from visits organized by the Secretariat of Public Education.

[1] The museum consists of the house that Trotsky lived in, the garden area and the outer walls with guard facilities, located in a quiet, residential neighborhood next to an arroyo that ran parallel to the Churubusco River.

[2][10] La Jornada newspaper called the atmosphere of the place “real, tense, not with abundance and not always happy.”[11] The complex was declared a historic monument in 1982.

[2][4][5] The rest of the complex space is taken up by the garden area, which is still maintained with tropical flowers and other plants, such as rare cacti, which Trotsky collected.

There are photos in the museum of Trotsky collecting cacti in the Mexican countryside and tending the garden along with the rabbits and chickens which were in the hutches and coops that still exist.

[4][5] In what were once guest quarters at the end of the garden, hang dozens of black-and-white photos of Trotsky and Natalia accompanied by celebrity friends, such as Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo.

[13] Events have been attended by officials from the city's Public Security agency, the borough of Coyoacán, technical schools and even the Cuban embassy.