Sparrow Hills
Boris Iofan made a mistake placing his draft skyscraper right on the edge of Sparrow Hills. The site was a potential landslide hazard. He made a worse mistake by insisting on his decision and was promptly replaced by Lev Rudnev, a 53-year-old rising star of Stalin's establishment. Rudnev had already built high-profile edifices like the 1932–1937 M. V. Frunze Military Academy and the 1947 "Marshals' Apartments" (Sadovaya-Kudrinskaya, 28), which earned the highest credits of the Party. He set the building 800 meters away from the cliff.