Attractions of Kharkiv region

The monument to Father Fedir, a character in the novel "Twelve Chairs" (1928) by Ilya Ilf and Yevhen Petrov, is installed on the 1st platform of the South Railway Station in Kharkiv.

The monument serves as an illustration of an episode of the novel in which Father Fedir writes a letter to his wife to the county town of N from the Kharkiv railway station, as well as a reminder of how Father Fedir was seen on the Donetsk railway: "He fled along the platform with a kettle of boiling water..".

Father Fedir is depicted in the image embodied by the Soviet film actor Mykhaylo Puhovkin in the screen adaptation of "12 Chairs" directed by Leonid Hayday (1971).

On the pedestal is a quote from his letter to his wife: "Kharkiv is a bustling city, the center of the Ukrainian Republic. After the province, it seems as if he has gone abroad."

Cossack Kharko (Kharyton) is the mythical founder of the city of Kharkiv, about whom several urban legends have been compiled.

According to the "Topographical description of the Kharkiv governorship" (1785), "...if we believe the rumor, one of the wealthy Ukrainians established a farm in this place, but who he was, where and when, there is no information about it, by the name of Kharyton, and according to the colloquialism, Kharko, from which this city and the river supposedly got their title."

The monument to the Founders of Kharkiv in honor of the city's 350th anniversary was opened in 2004 at the beginning of Nauky Avenue. Presented to the city by the famous sculptor Zurab Tsereteli. This is the first equestrian monument in the history of the city. It is a 12-ton bronze sculpture of a horseman, the Cossack Kharko. In his hand he holds a spear, a shield, behind his shoulders is a bow and a quiver of arrows. The height of the sculpture is 6 meters, the pedestal is 7 meters.

The monument to Ostap Bender, Ipolyt Matviyovych Vorobyaninov and Ellochka the cannibal - cult characters of the novel "12 Chairs" by Ilya Ilf and Yevhen Petrov - was opened in Kharkiv in 2005 on City Day.

The "Great Combiner", cast in bronze, sat on a bench installed in front of the entrance to one of Kharkiv's cafes. Kisa Vorobyaninov, who was looking for treasures hidden in a furniture set together with the "great combiner", is depicted as begging for alms. Ellochka in a defiant pose seems to invite passers-by to sit on the treasured chair.

In 2024, monuments to the characters of the novel "12 Chairs" in Kharkiv were dismantled as part of decolonization.

A sculpture depicting a student programmer is located in the city of Kharkiv near the central entrance to the Kharkiv National University of Radio Electronics.

Established in 2010 in honor of the 80th anniversary of the Kharkiv National University of Radio Electronics. The author of the project is Roman Blazhko, the designer is Viktor Honcharenko.

The monument to the student programmer was made of bronze with charitable funds.

The Museum of Local Lore named after Trokhym Sulima is located in the center of the village of Pechenihy in the historical building of the former Novo-Belhorod convict Central Prison for political prisoners.

The Novo-Belhorod convict Central Prison was built in Pechenihy (at that time - Novo-Belhorod) in 1854 and was part of the complex of buildings of the military settlement. At different times, well-known populists served their terms here: Oleksandr Dolhushyn, Ipolyt Myshkin, Yakiv Rybitsky, revolutionary worker Petro Aleksyeyev and others. The Ukrainian poet-revolutionary Pavlo Hrabovskyi was also imprisoned here. A cell with bunk beds and black-painted windows has been preserved.

The Pechenihy Museum of Local Lore was opened on March 26, 2002. The basis of the museum collection was the items from the former Public Historical Museum of the village of Pechenihy. The museum's funds include more than 3,300 objects, which are exhibited in 12 exhibition halls.

Of special value are the archaeological finds from the excavations of burial mounds of the catacomb culture of the III millennium BC and Neolithic settlements of the V-IV millennia BC.

The Scientific and Educational Museum of Sexual Cultures of the World was established in 1999 by the staff of the Department of Sexology and Medical Psychology of the Kharkiv Medical Academy.

The first museum of its kind in the post-Soviet space covers the sexual cultures of 12 countries. The exhibition presents paintings by ancient Egyptian artists, ancient Chinese drawings, ancient statuettes, reproductions of paintings by Picasso, Manet and other artists, modern drawings and photographs.

Part of the exhibition is devoted to the sexual education of children and adolescents. Particular attention is paid to the prevention of sexually transmitted diseases, especially AIDS.

The materials of the museum are selected in accordance with the requirements of the programs of educational institutions. There is a sex shop at the museum.

The National Literary and Memorial Museum of Hryhoriy Savvych Skovoroda is located in the former estate of the Kovalevsky landowners, where the great Ukrainian philosopher died in 1794 (according to other sources, in the building of the former church-parish school).

The house has a memorial room - a "quiet cell", where Skovoroda loved to work and in which he ended his life.

In a cozy, well-planned park, maintained in perfect condition, preserved memorable places associated with the great thinker. This is the skeleton of a huge 700-year-old oak on the shore of a pond with a memorial sign (1972, sculptors Lyubov Zhukovska, Dmytro Sova), under the cover of which wrote a philosopher, a well and a huge wooden landlord's barn, on a wide lawn in front of which events organized by the museum are held.

Not far from the manor house in the park is the grave of Hryhoriy Skovoroda. On the stylized tombstone under the roadside stone (1972, sculptors Lyubov Zhukovska, Dmytro Sova) carved a laconic and surprisingly capacious, worthy of a great philosopher author's epitaph: "The world caught me, but did not catch." A modest monument to Hryhoriy Skovoroda was erected at the entrance to the square (1972, sculptor Ivan Kavaleridze, architect Vasyl Hnyezdilov).

During the large-scale Russian invasion in 2022, the museum building was destroyed by a direct hit from a Russian missile. Part of the exposition was destroyed, but the most valuable exhibits were not damaged.

The national memorial complex "Height of Marshal Konev" was opened after reconstruction in 2003, on the eve of the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Kharkiv from the Nazi invaders.

In 1943, the headquarters of the commander of the Steppe Front was located here, from where Marshal Konev, in order to save the city from destruction, ordered a night assault on Kharkiv, and the next day the city was liberated. About half a million soldiers died in the battle, but this operation initiated the liberation of all of Ukraine.

The "Height of Marshal Konev" memorial was built in 1965, in 2003 a complete reconstruction was carried out. The complex includes a 17.5-meter-high stele, an exhibition of military equipment, a chapel in honor of John the Warrior, and the museum "Kharkiv region in the Second World War 1941-1945".

Konev's command post is reproduced in one of the museum's halls, and his last uniform is on display.

The Homilsha Forests are a reserve massif of deciduous forest on the banks of the Siverskyi Donets River 40 kilometers south of Kharkiv, between the villages of Velyka Homilsha and Koropove.

The national nature park "Homilsha Forests" was created in 2004, but as early as the 18th century, Peter I drew attention to the natural value of local landscapes, issuing a decree on the allocation of protected ship groves near Homilsha. In the 1970s, the "Homilsha Forest Dacha" reserve was created, recreation centers began to appear around it.

The list of rare plants in the forest is 132 species. One of the areas is called a "branch of the taiga" because very tall silver fir trees grow here. About 500 hectares of 130-150-year-old oak forest have been preserved to this day, and there are some 300-year-old oaks.

Rare birds are found here, including the white-tailed eagle, the burying eagle, the blue kingfisher, the bee-eater, the white-tailed eagle, the vulture, and others. Waterfowl liked the picturesque Kosach Bay.

Archaeological monuments of the Stone and Bronze Age, hillforts and burial grounds of Scythian, Alanic and Slavic antiquity have been preserved.

National Nature Park "Slobozhanskyi" was created in 2009 with the aim of preserving historical and cultural complexes and valuable natural territories of the forest-steppe zone of the Slobozhanshchyna region.

It is located on an area of ​​5,244 hectares in the territory of the Bohodukhiv district of the Kharkiv region in the valley of the Merla River (Dnipro River basin). Forest coenoses of natural origin are represented by oaks, pines, and in the depressions around the swamps - birches and alders.

The business card of Slobozhanskyi National Nature Park is relict lakes, small swamps and peat bogs - peculiar micro-reserves of boreal vegetation that have survived here since the last ice age.

The visitor center of the National Nature Park "Slobozhanskyi" is located on the territory of the Natalivka manor in the village of Volodymyrivka.

The wooden church of the Nativity of Christ was built in the village of Borova in 1782 at the expense of the parishioners. This is one of the oldest wooden churches of the Kharkiv region, a wonderful example of the wooden church architecture of the Slobozhanshchyna.

The church is one-story, three-log, made of oak logs, decorated with elegant decorative wood carvings.

At the beginning of the 19th century, the Church of the Nativity of Christ was reconstructed.

The first wooden Church of the Nativity of the Holy Virgin in Derhachi was built in 1685.

He stood on a sandy plain called Buryakivka. The builder of the church was Yakiv Turanskyi.

At the beginning of the 19th century, a new brick church was built, which was consecrated in 1838. The church has four thrones. The main throne in honor of the Nativity of the Most Holy Virgin.

On April 4, 2022, during the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Church of the Nativity of the Holy Virgin was damaged by Russian artillery fire. Shelling by the Russian occupiers damaged the facade and windows of the church, destroyed the Sunday school and the church shop.

The Church of the Nativity of the Holy Virgin in Cherkaski Tyshky was built in 1830 at the expense of the centurion Andriy Tykhotskyi and other parishioners.

However, the official annals of the church have been kept since 1772, when the wooden church of the Nativity of the Virgin in Tyshky is first mentioned.

The project of the new stone church was developed by the well-known at that time architect Yevhen Vasylyev, the author of the projects of many churches in Slobozhanshchyna. The iconostasis was created by the artist Illya Repin in the 1960s, while he was still a student at the Academy of Arts. In 1906, the church was significantly expanded at the expense of the descendants of the landowner Tykhotskyi.

During the Soviet era, the church was closed, the icons of Repin's work disappeared during the German occupation, but a few remained in the Kharkiv Art Museum. During the Second World War, the church was reopened, but until recently it remained in a dilapidated state.

Restoration is currently underway.

The Nova Vodolaha Museum of Local Lore is located in the center of the village of Nova Vodolaha.

In the ethnographic exposition, many household items of Slobozhanshchyna, brought from ethnographic expeditions, are collected.

The museum of the Izium city occupation by the Russian invaders was founded in 2022 by the publisher of the newspaper "Obriiy Iziumshchyny" Kostyantyn Hryhorenko with the participation of the Izium Museum of Local Lore. So far, the museum does not have its own premises.

Today, the museum's collection includes more than 200 exhibits. Among them are Russian propaganda posters and proclamations, street signs and announcements, pro-Russian newspapers, enemy flags, uniforms of the occupation forces, chevrons, personal items, dry rations. Presented soldier's canned food, sugar, matches - all with Russian markings.

You can also see the textbooks of educators who sided with the occupiers and were preparing to teach Izium schoolchildren according to the Russian curriculum.