According to O. Leibfreid (“Kharkiv: Architecture, Monuments, New Buildings. A Guide”), the apartment building at Hryhoriia Skovorody Street, 3 was built in 1914 based on a design by architect Oleksandr Rzhepishevskyi.

One of the best things about the house is that it has an enclosed courtyard, which you can access through the side gate.

The Art Nouveau façade of the building itself isn’t as striking or memorable as those of architect Rzhepishevskiy’s other buildings, but it’s still quite attractive. It isn’t marred by enlarged 1990s balconies, and only the glassed-in sections of the loggia detract from the overall appearance, as does the jarring mix of different shops on the ground floor.

Access to the building is also unrestricted. Here you can see the original Mettlach tiles.

On the ground floor, you can see a beautiful Corinthian order column and a coffered “Roman” ceiling. There is even such a ceiling in the anteroom, which features decorative fireplace-like niches with recesses at the top; perhaps flower pots were once placed there.

The doors on the upper floors have been preserved, as has the skylight above the entrance.

In the courtyard, there is an annex with its own address at Hryhoriia Skovorody Street, 3B, but it was apparently built at the same time as the main building or was originally part of it. This is evident from the decorative brickwork patterns beneath the windows and the bay window—they are exactly the same as those on the main house. It is possible that the household staff lived here.

Unfortunately, the original entrance doors have not survived, and the “spiderweb” glass screen above them has simply been painted over.

The building was damaged by a Russian missile strike on the “Nikolsky” shopping center in the spring of 2022—the blast wave shattered many of its windows.