The Old Arbat, located between the gate area of Arbat and Smolenskaya square, is om of the oldest surviving streets in Moscow. This symbol of the old town has been immortalized in poems, novels, songs, and even movies a fair amount of times and is a popular tourist attraction. Today under this name we mean a narrow and busy street, but in fact Arbat is a historical district of Moscow, which celebrated its 500th anniversary in 1993.
Artisans and merchants first settled here, but by the end of the 18th century the area became mostly populated by the petty nobility. Tolstoy, Gagarin, Dolgorukiy and Kropotkin, among many others, are some of the historical names associated to the street. Arbat used to be a quiet and cozy district that had few shops around: small houses here, surrounded by gardens, were mostly built either in wood or in the Empire style. It was an area where doctors, writers, and lawyers liked to settle. At various times Arbat was home of Pushkin, Rachmaninov, Skryabin, Gogol, Tolstoy, Saltykov-Shchedrin, Chekhov and Blok. The street is also inseparably linked to the life of the director Vakhtangov and the theater named after him.
Between the years 1974-1986 a pedestrian area abundant in shops and cafes was created. Here the artists’ work, street singers sing, and Russian souvenirs are sold.
The museum-apartment of Pushkin, the house-museum of Marina Tsvetaeva, as well as the house-museum of Mikhail Lermontov, are also all located in the Arbat street. Old mansions with moldings, balconies, and caryatids have been well preserved and attract thousands of tourists day by day. When speaking of the Arbat it is impossible not to mention the restaurant "Prague", which has existed here since 1872.
