Vladimirklooster, Eastern Orthodox monastery in Irkutsk, Russia.
Vladimirklooster is a Russian Orthodox men's monastery on Kashtakovskaya Hill in the Rabocheye suburb of Irkutsk, on the right bank of the Angara. Its white Knyaze-Vladimirsky church was designed by architect Vladislav Kudelsky for merchant Vasily Litvintsev and founded in 1888; the monastery itself opened on 28 July 1903. The complex also held a church-teachers' seminary, a two-year model school and a men's almshouse.
The church was built in 1888 to mark 900 years of the Baptism of Rus, funded by merchant Vasily Litvintsev and designed by architect Vladislav Kudelsky. The monastery itself opened on 28 July 1903. Closed in 1922, its buildings later housed an NKVD cavalry regiment, a colony for homeless children and a geological laboratory. It was returned to the eparchy in the late 1990s.
The monastery holds regular Orthodox services that visitors can attend and observe in a respectful manner. The sound of chants and the smell of incense give a direct sense of how religious life is practiced here today.
The monastery sits within the city of Irkutsk and can be reached on foot from the central areas. Visitors should dress modestly, covering shoulders and knees, as services may be in progress at any time of day.
Although the monastery is named after a 10th-century prince, it was built in the 19th century in a style that consciously imitated medieval Russian forms. This gap between the person it honors and the building itself makes it a monument to a past that predates it by nearly 900 years.
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