Every city in Russia has house museums. Still would! Everyone is proud of the famous natives of their cities and often make a museum out of the house or apartment where the famous object lived. Moscow is no exception in this regard, but unlike other cities, in Moscow there are house-museums even of those famous people who were not natives of this city. Our trip will be to one of these houses. We are going to the Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov Museum. From his birth in Kyiv to his complete and final move to Moscow, the writer lived 30 years of a rich and complex life.
Prices at the Bulgakov Museum
An entrance ticket to the museum costs 200 rubles. There are preferential offers for various groups of citizens:
- Schoolchildren from regions of the Russian Federation and pensioners can purchase a ticket for 100 rubles.
- Schoolchildren from Moscow, full-time students, children under 7 years of age and other preferential categories have the right to visit the museum free of charge.
Free amateur photography is allowed in Bulgakov’s “bad apartment.” Every third Sunday of the month, admission to the museum is free for everyone.
Prices on the official website of the Bulgakov Museum in Moscow
Tickets
You can buy tickets on the official website of the Bulgakov Apartment Museum. You can pay for your purchase online, to the courier, or make a reservation and buy tickets in person at the museum box office.
Tour of the Mikhail Bulgakov Museum Buy at
Blue office, © Natalya Ovcharenko
"The Secret Room" in the Bulgakov House
An intriguing name and controversial value of this very “secret room”... Although, why not? In general, the essence is this: in small groups of 3-5 people, you are “pushed into a tiny dark room, music sounds and blue silhouettes and quotes from Bulgakov appear around you. I'm telling you, controversial entertainment, but funny 
Excursions to the Bulgakov Museum
You can visit the Bulgakov House Museum individually or as part of a group. The price of the excursion includes the price of the entrance ticket. The museum offers the following types of excursions and events to get acquainted with the work of Mikhail Bulgakov:
- Evening excursions on Wednesdays at 18:00, 19:00 and 20:00. The cost for one participant is 400 rubles. Duration - 1.5 hours. Group - up to 10 people with 2 accompanying persons, who are admitted free of charge.
- Sightseeing tours of the museum: group of 10 schoolchildren and 2 accompanying persons - 2,500 rubles; up to 25 schoolchildren and 2 accompanying persons - 4,500 rubles; individual excursion for up to 3 adults - 2,000 rubles; group of up to 10 adults - 3,500 rubles; group of up to 25 adults - 6,000 rubles; excursion in English - 1,000 rubles.
- Thematic excursion “Why the cat and why the Hippopotamus in the sunset novel “The Master and Margarita”” - 500 rubles per person. During the author's excursion, participants will learn about the connection between cats and evil spirits in folklore and what Bulgakov's cat Behemoth has in common with cats from other works of world literature. At the end of the event, a black cat living in the museum comes out to visit the guests if he is in the mood.
The Behemoth cat appeared in the Bulgakov Museum in 2021, and another black cat Behemoth has lived in the neighboring theater-museum since 2005.
- Evening excursion on Thursdays “Housing Issue” : ticket for one person - 500 rubles; group of up to 25 people - 5,000 rubles; group of schoolchildren up to 25 people - 5,000 rubles. A special excursion program introduces visitors to the life and work of M. A. Bulgakov, as well as the theme of housing in his works.
- Lesson “The Master and Margarita”: how to read the novel?” : 3,000 rubles for a group of up to 10 people with 2 accompanying persons and 5,000 rubles for a group of up to 25 people with 2 accompanying persons. The lesson is suitable for 11th grade students.
- Lesson “Heart of a Dog” or what happened in Kalabukhovsky?” : 3,000 rubles for a group of up to 10 people with 2 accompanying persons and 5,000 rubles for a group of up to 25 people with 2 accompanying persons. Literary investigation as part of the lesson will be of interest to 9th grade students.
- Night theatrical excursions “Surprises of the fifth dimension” and “50 - an apartment with a strange reputation”: 2,000 rubles per participant, 35,000 rubles per group, 25,000 rubles per group from a preferential category (schoolchildren, pensioners, students).
Why is Bulgakov’s “bad” apartment? Soviet life in a large communal apartment was indeed far from good; rather, it could be called unbearable: lack of heating, noisy drunken neighbors who brewed moonshine, problems with water and light, mold and dirt in the common kitchen. In his diary, M. A. Bulgakov called his home “a vile room in a vile house.” And already in the novel “The Master and Margarita” he speaks of housing as “house 302 bis with a bad apartment 50.”
The Bulgakov Museum in Moscow also offers walking tours of the city with a visit to the museum-apartment. The cost of such excursions is from 400 to 600 rubles. You can find out more about excursions to Bulgakov’s bad apartment by calling the museum or on the official website of the Bulgakov house-museum.
You can purchase tickets for excursions to the Bulgakov House Museum on the website, at the museum box office or by phone: +7(495)699-53-66.
Entrance leading to apartment No. 50, © Natalya Ovcharenko
Mysticism of the novel
Since the writing of The Master and Margarita, a huge number of mystical events have occurred, which happened mainly when trying to film or stage the novel. The death of the great Russian actor Alexander Abdulov, who played the main role in the series of the same name, is associated with this novel. Troubles happened to other people too. Alexander Adabashyan, who got the role of Berlioz, was hospitalized with a heart attack some time after the end of filming. Oleg Basilashvili lost his voice after reading Woland's monologue, and Oleg Yankovsky completely abandoned this role.
Viktor Avilov also played Woland, but not in the cinema, but in the theater. Colleagues tell how, before the start of the performance in 1995, he experienced clinical death, after which he continued to play, and an inoperable tumor was soon discovered.
Mikhail Afanasyevich himself could not finish the novel for a long time. He either threw it away or picked it up again. The first manuscript was even destroyed by him with his own hand. But not all historians see some kind of mysticism in this. The fact is that the day before, a ban was imposed on Bulgakov’s play “The Cabal of the Saint.”
There was also an anonymous note warning the government about the harsh attacks in the author’s new work, which he read at a writers’ convention, where he was informed that the work would not be allowed through censorship in this form. A letter to the government, dated March 28, 1930, has been preserved, in which Mikhail Afanasyevich wrote that he destroyed the novel about the devil with his own hands.
Opening hours of the museum “Bad Apartment” by Bulgakov
The museum can be visited any day of the week except Monday. Opening hours on other days:
- Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday - from 12:00 to 19:00. On Wednesday, tours continue late in the evening, but entry for individual visitors closes at 19:00.
- Thursday - from 14:00 to 21:00.
Opening hours may vary on days of various events, such as “Night at the Museum”, “Night of the Arts”, etc.
© Tatyana Lisker
Poster of the Bulgakov Museum
The museum regularly organizes exhibitions on the works of M. A. Bulgakov, as well as those dedicated to his biography, various periods of his life, where you can learn many little-known facts. There are also interesting lectures on the Soviet era. The Bulgakov Theater, located in the next entrance, regularly stages performances and not only based on the writer’s works; you can check their schedule on the theater’s website.
Poster of events on the official website of the Bulgakov Museum in Moscow
Exposition
Bulgakov's apartment museum acquired the writer's personal belongings for display, and objects are also displayed here that convey the atmosphere of the times of the writer's life. The main exhibition is located in the first and blue offices, the living room, and the “communal kitchen.” The exhibition begins at the entrance: the walls of the “bad staircase” are painted with drawings based on the themes of Mikhail Afanasyevich’s works. And in the wardrobe there is a hanger from the writer’s room, antique suitcases and a chest with a secret. The room is interestingly decorated, telling the story of the entire house - one of the few “wells” in Moscow. In one of the rooms of the M. A. Bulgakov Museum, the atmosphere of the editorial office of the newspaper “Gudok”, where the writer worked, was recreated. You can read more about the description of each room and see a map of the Bulgakov Museum on the official website of the Bulgakov Museum in Moscow.
Virtual tour of Bulgakov’s museum-apartment in Moscow
© Tatyana Lisker
Mikhail Bulgakov's room
The main attraction of this “bad apartment” is the room of Mikhail Afanasyevich Bulgakov. The exhibition is presented in such a way as to immerse the visitor into Bulgakov’s life as much as possible. In this room, where the office was combined with the living room and bedroom, Bulgakov’s first novel “The White Guard” was written. A massive table crowds out everything else from the space, taking up most of the room.
Bulgakov lived in this room for three difficult and difficult years. In this room he received news of the defeat of the White Army in the Caucasus, in whose ranks his brothers fought. All the feelings that the writer had for this piece of space, behind which there were communal battles, ultimately resulted on paper in one simple phrase - bad apartment.
How to get to the Bulgakov House Museum in Moscow
Bulgakov’s “bad apartment” is located in the Presnensky district of the city at the address: st. Bolshaya Sadovaya, 10. To find the entrance to the museum, you need to go through the arch to entrance 6, go up to the 4th floor to apartment No. 50. The museum is located within walking distance from Bulgakov Square and the Aquarium Garden, the Moscow Planetarium, and the Patriarch's Ponds. You can get here by buses No. B, T10, T39, 869, M1, N1, 101, 904, stop “Metro Mayakovskaya”.
Moscow public transport schedule
You can also get to the Bulgakov Museum-Apartment on Patriarch's Street by taxi: Yandex.Taxi, Uber, Gett, Maxim, and Taxi Vezet services operate in Moscow.
How to get to the Bulgakov Museum by metro
The fastest way to get to the museum is to take the metro. You can choose from the following options:
- Go to the Mayakovskaya station of the Zamoskvoretskaya line (green line). From there, walk about 550 meters to the museum.
- Go to the Pushkinskaya station on the Tagansko-Krasnopresnenskaya line (purple line), from which you need to walk about 1.5 kilometers.
- Go to the Chekhovskaya station on the Serpukhovsko-Timiryazevskaya line (gray line) and walk 1.5 kilometers to the museum.
Moscow metro map
Panorama of the entrance to the arch of the museum building “Bad Apartment” by Bulgakov:
Video about the Bulgakov house-museum in Moscow:
History of the apartment
It is believed that apartment No. 50 on the street. B. Sadovaya became the prototype of that very “bad apartment” in “The Master” in which Likhodeev and Berlioz settled, and which at the end of the novel was burned down by the cat Behemoth.
Bulgakov himself lived in this apartment in 1921-1922. He wrote to his sister that he was dissatisfied with her, that he did not feel settled and that he did not like his neighbors. And this despite the fact that getting a job there was not so easy. Bulgakov was helped in this by Nadezhda Krupskaya, who worked with him in one of the magazines.
