page_title: Seven Sisters (Moscow)
section_title: Moscow State University
hierarchical_section_title: Seven Sisters (Moscow) / Moscow buildings / Moscow State University
caption_attribution_description: English: View of MGU (Lomonosov Moscow State University)
context_page_description: The Seven Sisters are a group of seven skyscrapers in Moscow designed in the Stalinist style. They were built from 1947 to 1953 in an elaborate combination of Russian Baroque and Gothic styles.
  These towers are inspired by the Municipal Building in Manhattan. At the time of construction they were the tallest buildings in Europe, and the main building of Moscow State University remained the tallest building in Europe until 1997.
  The seven are: Hotel Ukraina, Kotelnicheskaya Embankment Apartments, the Kudrinskaya Square Building, the Hilton Moscow Leningradskaya Hotel, the main building of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the main building of Moscow State University, and the Red Gates Administrative Building. There were two more skyscrapers in the same style planned that were never built: the Zaryadye Administrative Building and the Palace of the Soviets.
context_section_description: 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.
  The building was constructed in part by several thousand Gulag inmates.  When the construction was nearing completion, some inmates were housed on the 24th and 25th levels to reduce transportation costs and the number of guards required.
  The main tower, which consumed over 40,000 metric tons of steel, was inaugurated on September 1, 1953. At 787.4 feet or 240 meters tall, it was the tallest building in Europe from its completion until 1990. It is still the tallest educational building in the world.
caption: Moscow State University
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