Attractions of Odesa

Monument to Armand Emmanuel du Plessi, Duke de Rishelye, who was one of the most popular Odesa mayors.

The Duke de Rishelye, a Frenchman by birth, emigrated to Russia after the Great French Revolution of 1789. In 1790, he participated in the capture of Izmail, in 1803 he was appointed the city of Odesa, and then the governor-general of Novorossiya.

Richelieu began to be called Emmanuel Yosypovych. For him, Odesa received a temporary exemption from taxes and was actively built.

When the Bourbons returned to power in France in 1814, the duke left for his homeland, donating all his property to the Odesa Rishelye Lyceum.

After his death in 1822, fundraising began, and in 1828 a monument to Duke Rishelye was erected. Sculptor Ivan Martos created the duke dressed in a Roman toga with a scroll in his hand and three brass bas-reliefs symbolizing agriculture, trade and justice. Today it is the most famous symbol of Odesa.

Pranksters recommend looking at Duke from the water hatch to the left of the monument. From this angle, the scroll in Duke Rishelye's hand looks very ambiguous.

Odesa cognac plant is the oldest enterprise of the industry in Ukraine.

Founded in 1863 by the South Russian Society "Black Sea Winery". Later, the factory was bought by the Shustov family of famous industrialists.

At the World Exhibition in Paris in 1900, Shustov's cognac won first place, thus earning the right to be called "cognac".

Currently, PJSC "Odesa Cognac Factory" produces 16 varieties of cognacs, starting from the ordinary "Desna" and ending with collector's ones - "Yuvileynyi", "Odesa", "Kyiv", "Zoloty Duke".

In 2013, the Mykola Shustov Cognac Museum was opened, which recreates the atmosphere of ancient cognac cellars. The museum includes several "caisson" halls: three exhibition and tasting halls, a cinema, a hall of changing exhibitions.

In particular, a copy of a copper Charente alembic for alcohol smoking from the end of the 19th century by the French firm Prulho, a full-size model of a pre-revolutionary conca, as well as a bottle of Shustov cognac from 1900, which won the Grand Prix at the World Exhibition in Paris, are presented.

A tour of the museum includes part of the production (blending workshop and alcohol aging workshop), a visit to the old cellars, as well as a tasting of the best "Shustov" cognacs.

Fixed tour times: 10.00, 12.00, 14.00, 16.00 and 18.00

The original building of the Arab Cultural Center in Odesa has every chance of becoming an architectural monument.

The large Moorish-style house was built in 2001 at the expense of Arab businessman Adnan Kivan. The mosque stands out strongly in the urban development and is a real eastern pearl of Odesa.

When entering the prayer hall, men and women must remove their shoes, and women are issued long robes with hoods. In the prayer hall, openwork elm on the stair railings and architectural elements make the interior decoration of the mosque elegant and airy. Apart from a few small bookshelves on both sides of the hall, there is no other furniture. The entire floor is covered with a soft carpet, the pattern of which seems to divide the carpet into equal squares, which serve as conventional delimitation of the seats for those who pray. Under the ceiling, the main decoration is a large crystal chandelier shining with hundreds of lights.

The Arab Cultural Center in Odesa is open for tours that introduce visitors to Arab culture. There is an Arabic language school and a library.

Arkadiya is a resort area of ​​the city, the Odesa Riviera, the center of night life.

It is famous for its modern, well-equipped beaches and a large number of restaurants, night clubs and other entertainment facilities that work around the clock during the holiday season.

There are hotels, sanatoriums, rest houses, a water clinic, and a resort polyclinic located on the park territory near the sea.

The Cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary is the main Roman Catholic church of Odesa.

Its construction began in 1848 according to the project of Franchesko Morandi with the support of the governor of the Novorossiya region, Count Vorontsov. Before that, there was a small church in the city, built in 1822 according to the project of Giovanni Frapolli on the territory that was allocated to Catholics in 1805 by the first mayor of Odesa, Dyuk de Rishelye.

In 1935, the church was closed, a local history museum was placed in it, and after the Second World War - a sports complex. The marble altars were destroyed, the shape of the Gothic windows was changed, and the stone vaults were destroyed.

Only in 1991, the church was returned to the Catholic community of the city. General of the infantry Count Oleksandr Lanzheron is buried here.

The building was built in the style of classicism (architect Franz Boffo) for the Odesa Commodity Exchange. The main facade is decorated with 12 columns and sculptures. Later, the City Duma (now the Odesa City Council) was located here.

On the square in front of the Duma, an ancient 250-pound trophy cast-iron cannon from the sunken English steam frigate "Tiger" has been installed in memory of the Crimean War.

The monument to Pushkin, created in 1888 at the expense of the townspeople, was installed at the beginning of Prymorsky Boulevard with its back to the Duma (according to legend, this is how the townspeople expressed their attitude to the city authorities, who allocated not a penny from the budget for the monument).

The City Garden in Odesa is the oldest public park in the city and one of the main centers of the city's social life.

This is a small square with an area of ​​about 1.5 hectares at the end of Derybasivska Street, in the block between Derybasivska and Lanzheronivska, not far from Soborna Square. Founded in 1803 by Feliks de Rybas, the brother of the founder of Odesa, Yosyp Derybas, as a private kindergarten on his own plot of land, it was later transferred to the city.

The main decoration of the City Garden is a two-hundred-year-old fountain with a bowl made of Carrara marble. The Summer Theater of the City Philharmonic (1949, architect Rehina Volodymyrska), the music pavilion-rotunda (1943), as well as several original sculptures are located here: the monument to Leonid Utyosov, the monument to Serhiy Utochnik, the sculptures "Lion" and "Lion ", the monument to the "Twelfth Chair".

Derybasivska is a pedestrian street in the center of Odesa, celebrated by writers and poets. It was named after the first Odesa mayor Osip Derbas (Khose de Ribas).

At the very beginning of the street, there is a monument to Deribas, popularly nicknamed "the grasshopper". The street is built with low-rise buildings of the 19th century, the first floors of which are occupied by numerous shops, restaurants and cafes with outdoor summer areas.

Traditionally, major city events take place on Derybasivska Street, in particular the Humor Parade during the annual "Humorina" celebration on April 1. On other days, the street is open for walking, and there is a brisk trade in paintings and souvenirs. The fair town "Odesa Fair" with wooden houses selling street food and drinks is constantly operating.

There are several interesting sculptures in the park zone of the City Garden: a monument to Leonid Utyosov, a monument to Serhiy Utochnik, sculptures "Lion" and "Lioness", a monument to the "Twelfth Chair".

Odesa cultural and health complex "Nemo" is located in the center of the city, on the beach "Lanzheron ".

Includes a dolphinarium, an oceanarium and a hotel. Opened in 2005 for International Children's Day.

The complex meets international standards, keeping marine mammals meets all conventions and requirements. The large demonstration hall is open in the warm season and can accommodate up to 900 spectators (closed in winter, it can accommodate 600 spectators). Visitors are offered swimming with dolphins, dolphin therapy sessions.

The exposition of the oceanarium consists of two departments. The aquarium features inhabitants of fresh and sea water, more than 100 species of fish and more than 50 species of invertebrates.

The basis of the exotarium was Serhiy Duz's long-term collection, which includes more than 40 species of amphibians and reptiles and more than 60 species of terrestrial invertebrates, as well as one of the best collections of tropical butterflies in Ukraine, which includes more than 1,000 specimens.

The Experimentarium is the first branch of the Odesa Museum of Interesting Science. It opened at the end of January 2024 in the Atrium shopping center after the destruction of the main space of the Museum of Interesting Science on Shevchenko Avenue in the summer of 2023 by a Russian missile strike.

The museum team managed to save almost all of its exhibits, with the exception of special rooms, and after only 7 months, the Museum moved part of its exposition to a new location and continued its work as an Experimentarium with 23 exhibits of the collection. Now everyone who wants to can visit this space in the Atrium shopping center, which helps children to distract themselves from the war for 1.5-2 hours with scientific experiments.

If in other museums you can't even touch the valuable exhibits, then in the Experimentarium you can not only touch, check, feel and see everything in action. Both children and adults can conduct interesting experiments and unusual experiments.

The main task of the Experimentarium is to show schoolchildren and students that even the most difficult tasks and the longest formulas can be exciting, if you just look at them from a different angle.

The Experimentarium aims to teach subjects of the natural cycle: physics, chemistry, biology, geology, astronomy, mathematics and many other fields of knowledge.

On April 12, 2024, the Museum of Interesting Science resumed its work at a new location in the Primorsky district of Odesa.

The Odesa Football Museum is located in the Chornomorets Stadium complex. Opened in 2012 after the reconstruction of the stadium.

The exposition tells about the history of Odesa football and FC "Chornomorets" since the founding of the club in 1936. Photos of all football players who played for the club, coaches, the first matches with the participation of the Chornomorets team are presented.

The form of players of different periods, boots, goalkeeper gloves, balls, etc. is of the greatest interest.

During the tour you can visit the bowl of the stadium, locker rooms, technical areas, conference hall.

A branch of the Greek Cultural Foundation (Athens) was opened in Odesa in 1994 in a historic building, where in 1814 a secret revolutionary-patriotic organization "Filiki Eteria" was established, which was engaged in preparing the national liberation movement in Greece.

The exposition also demonstrates the activities and life of the Greek colony in Odesa in the pre-revolutionary period.

The Genocide Museum "Territory of Memory" in Odesa opened in 2024 by Odesa Holocaust Research Center. The institution is located in the place of the Central Post Office in the center of the city.

The exposition reveals the history of the appearance of the term genocide, the fate of its authorship by Raphael Lemkin, the essence of the concept of the crime of genocide in international law, the tragic pages of the Holocaust and the history of salvation, the themes of the Armenian and Roma genocide, the Holodomor in Ukraine, the deportation of the Crimean Tatars, the genocides of the 21st century. A separate location is dedicated to the Russian-Ukrainian war.

The miniatures represent the railway station from which the Tatars were deported, the powder warehouses where Odesa Jews were burned, the episode of mass shooting and torture in Buch, the destroyed drama theater in Mariupol, Zmeyiny Island and the destruction of the Moscow cruiser.

The modern interactive exhibition space makes extensive use of multimedia digital technologies. A special emotional atmosphere is created with the help of point lighting. The multifunctional museum space includes a library and a discussion platform.

The Holy Assumption Monastery is the most famous abode in Odesa, founded by Metropolitan Havryil.

Since 1946, the summer residence of the Moscow Patriarchs was located here, the monastery was named Patriarchy, and the Odesa Theological Seminary was transferred here. The building of the patriarchal residence has been preserved on the territory.

The first stone temple was built in 1825 on the site of a wooden one (it was later destroyed by the Bolsheviks). In 1834, a second monastery church with a bell tower was built in honor of the icon of the Mother of God "Life-giving Source" (now Uspensky) with the funds donated to the temple by the Odesa merchant Dariya Kharlambu.

Today, there is a miraculous icon of the Mother of God "The Milkmaid", painted by Athos monks in the 17th century.

The Holy Trinity Greek Church was built according to the project of architects Dzhovanni Frapolli and Arkadiy Todorov in the style of classicism.

Founded in 1795, it was intended for the Greek community of the city, and was originally made of wood. In 1804, the solemn laying of the stone temple took place, the construction lasted 4 years. In 1821, the Patriarch of Constantinople Hrihoriy V, who was executed by the Turks, was buried here (later the remains were transferred to Athens).

From 1936 to 1941, the church was closed.

The oldest temple in the city. The marble floor is partially preserved.

Since January 4, 2006 - the Holy Trinity Cathedral of the Odesa Metropolis of the UOC of the Moscow Patriarchate.