The neoclassical mansion at Hryhoriia Skovorody Street, 100 is an architectural landmark built in 1910 by architect V. Velychko for brick manufacturer Semen Yakovlevich Tolkachev.

In 1913, the building was converted into a children’s sanatorium for the treatment of bone tuberculosis.

The private school “Lestvitsa” had been located there since 2006, but it moved to a new building in 2018.

We have already published an article about Tolkachev. The author is Viktor Ivanov from Kramatorsk, who owns an impressive collection of more than 750 bricks and roof tiles.

Tolkachyov’s bricks were marked with the “С.Я.Т” stamp; he owned two factories in Kharkiv, where 320 workers produced 8 million bricks a year.

The factories were located at Hryhoriia Skovorody Street, 96 and Petropavlovskyi Lane, 19.

Semyon Yakovlevich lived to be 73 and died in exile in Germany in 1923. The historic neighborhood around Students’ka Street (formerly Tolkachevskaya) is still known as Tolkachevka.