Vladimir Sherwood won the commission after a prolonged competition, and the article calls the design neo-Russian. It was built from 1875 to 1881 between Red Square and Manege Square, on the site of the Principal Medicine Store, a Moscow Baroque building from the reign of Peter the Great. Ivan Zabelin, Aleksey Uvarov and other Slavophiles founded the museum in 1872, and a board of trustees oversaw construction.
The first 11 halls opened in 1883. Viktor Vasnetsov, Henryk Siemiradzki and Ivan Aivazovsky decorated the interiors in the Russian Revival style, and Soviet authorities plastered over the murals as gaudy.
In 1895 it was renamed the Tsar Alexander III Imperial Russian History Museum. All 40 halls have been open since spring 2007. The article gives no dimensions or materials.
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