Moscow Red Square: 10 things to know

The Moscow Red Square is where the Victory Day Parade takes place every year and it is a place that’s filled with history. Here are the 10 essential things you will want to know about this fantastic place.

1. The Square is situated between the residence of the Russian President, the Kremlin, and a commercial area.

2. Oddly enough, the name doesn’t come from the colour symbolising Communism, as some would tend to think. It comes from the colour of the bricks around it.

3. One of the buildings around it is Lenin’s Mausoleum, where Vladimir Iliyich Lenin’s embalmed body is kept.

4. Another very important landmark that is situated in the Red Square is Cathedral of Basil the Blessed, that everybody tends to recognize in pictures.

5. At first, the Square was intended to be the city’s most important marketplace.

6. Many consider it the central point of Moscow, since streets go from here to almost every important part of the city.

7. During the Communist years, it was the site of the government of the Soviet Union.

8. It also was the place where a lot of important parades took place on various important holidays.

9. One of the most important parades was held in 1945. The Russian Army marched through the square and then went straight to defeat the Nazi army.

10. Facing the square is the GUM shopping centre, that was founded in the 1900s and was also the headquarters of some of Stalin’s committees, and then it was a display of the Communist leader’s wife’s body, until the 1950s when it was turned into a mall again.