Church of the Annunciation in Sokolniki, Eastern Orthodox church building in Sokolniki District, Russia.
The Church of the Annunciation is an Orthodox church on Matrosskaya Tishina Street in Sokolniki, Moscow. It consists of a small single-domed quadrangular main block, a spacious hall and a bell tower. The bell tower's upper tier and the dome were dismantled in 1923, and the building was restored and re-consecrated in 2014.
Built for the barracks of the Grenadier Sapper Battalion and consecrated on 27 October 1906, the church followed a standard military design first realised at Peterhof in 1903. In 1923 the Sokolniki district council handed the building to the military for a club; the dome and upper bell tower were dismantled, and it later held a guardhouse and, from 1965, a courier communications station. Patriarch Alexy II established a patriarchal metochion here on 2 June 2004 at the request of Airborne Forces commander Alexander Kolmakov, and Patriarch Kirill performed the great consecration on 19 December 2014.
The church is the main church of the Russian Airborne Forces, a status granted on 14 December 2019. It hosts ceremonies for consecrating military banners and services attended by servicemen, and its clergy travel to training grounds and areas of military exercises.
The church stands on Matrosskaya Tishina Street in Sokolniki, near the former sapper battalion barracks. It is an active military church, so services may be attended by uniformed personnel and access can be restricted during ceremonies. Visitors should dress modestly and keep quiet on the grounds.
The church's bells had an unusual 'wooden' tone because of the high tin content in their alloy. The building was the only one of about ten churches built to a standard military design in Moscow, and since 2019 it has been the main church of the Russian Airborne Forces.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 94,137 contributors worldwide.