Also known as the Podil Synagogue or the Rosenberg Synagogue. The oldest of the currently operating Kyiv synagogues. The synagogue was built in 1894-1895 at the expense of the merchant Gabriel-Yakov Geselevich Rosenberg, who owned the land plot and the building itself. Architect Nnikolai Gordenin (also designed the building on Andreevsky Spusk, where today Bulgakov Museum) designed the building in the Moorish style. Since the construction of synagogues in the then Kyiv was difficult due to the limited rights of residence in the city of Jews, Rosenberg initially agreed with the city authorities on the construction of a personal mansion, and then received permission from the provincial government to allegedly adapt the finished mansion into a prayer house.
At the beginning of the 20th century, Rosenberg’s nephew, Baron Vladimir Gunzburg, son of Horace Gunzburg, became the owner of the synagogue building. With his funds, in 1915-1916, the synagogue was reconstructed with internal redevelopment (architect Valerian Rykov).
During Soviet times, the synagogue in Podol remained operational until 1929, but then it was closed by order of the authorities and transferred to the district club of handicraft workers. However, after the end of the Great Patriotic War, in 1945, the activities of the synagogue were resumed. According to data for the 1950s, up to 30,000 believers visited the synagogue on major Jewish holidays. For a long time it was the only functioning synagogue in Kyiv. In 1969, she established her own matse bakery.
In the 1990s, a yeshiva was created at the synagogue. During 2001-2003, the building was reconstructed with the restoration of the facade according to the architectural design of Nikolai Gardenin, the addition of a new lobby in the rear and the transformation of the prayer hall. The most valuable details of the hall’s decoration, created in the 1940s (synagogue ark, pictorial inserts), were preserved; The new decorations of the synagogue were thematic stained glass windows and the bronze sculptural composition “Jerusalem Sphere” (sculptor Frank Meisler, also the author of the Mazepa monument). Eduard Shifrin and Alexander Rodnyansky provided significant philanthropic assistance during the reconstruction of the synagogue. With their funds, in the 2000s, two new buildings of Jewish public and educational institutions were erected to the left and right of the synagogue building.
Where is the synagogue of the Kyiv Jewish religious community?
Shchekavitskaya street, 29