Red Gates Administrative Building

Natalya Garnelis/TASS
Tall enough as it is, at 138 metres (453 feet), the tower at Ploschad Krasnye Vorota (Krasnye Vorota Square) looks even taller as it stands at the highest point of Sadovoye Koltso. This administrative and residential building, designed by Alexey Dushkin and Boris Mezentsev, was constructed in adverse conditions concurrently with the construction of Krasnye Vorota Metro station. The tower constantly threatened to collapse into the Metro pit. To make sure that never happened, the tower was built on pre-frozen ground and at an incline. Some of the best engineering talent was recruited to design the tower and calculate the incline. The same trick with the freezing of the ground was used when they built the Moscow Metro. The tower replaced an old neighbourhood. Poet Mikhail Lermontov was born in one of the houses there.