Martyn Brothers House

The two-storey red brick house was built in 1893 to the design of Rostov architect Nikolai Matveyevich Sokolov. The house was built in the spirit of Russian Gothic Revival eclecticism, combining elements of Russian and German architecture.[2]

In the 1910s, George Martyn was Consul of the United States, and had his reception room in the building.[3] In the 1920s, the building was nationalized. On the ground floor were various institutions, and on the upper floor were communal apartments. After the Great Patriotic War, the building was renovated, during which time the roof windows were lost.[3]

In 2007, the building was transferred to the National Sholokhov Museum-Reserve, and restoration works began.[4] Repairs lasted between 2008 and 2014, with the building opening as the Sholokhov Centre on 22 May 2015, marking the 110th anniversary of Mikhail Sholokhov's birth, and Russia's Year of Literature. The centre provides exhibition space and a venue for cultural and educational projects. It hosts lectures, museum classes, creative meetings, and theme nights.[5] Its first exhibition was "Traces of Cossack Antiquity", displaying artefacts from the Hermitage Museum's collections.[5]