two weeks later destroy a historic building in Lviv, Russian missiles hit downtown Odessa, a World Heritage Site, killing one person and injuring 22 others. In a series of rocket attacks on the city, 61 buildings were damaged, including 28 structures considered very important for Ukrainian architectural heritage.
Beginning July 19, Russia carried out a series of missile attacks on Odessa, a port city on the Black Sea, targeting grain and oil terminals and port facilities. The attacks began after Russia pulled out of the Black Sea Grain Initiative on Monday July 17.
On July 23, missiles hit the city center, damaging the Orthodox Cathedral of the Transfiguration (a replica of the original 1794 church destroyed by the Soviet government in 1936 and rebuilt in 2010) as well as structures associated with classical and modernist architecture dating from the 19th and 20th centuries. According to Odessa City Administrationthe most significant damage affected so-called “income” houses and dwelling houses belonging to members of the aristocracy in the 19th century century. Some of the damaged structures were built as early as the 1830s.
Oksana Dovgopolova, professor of philosophy at the Odessa II Mechnykov National University and curator of the Past/Future/Art cultural memory platform, narrated Hyperallergic that although the direct hit on one of the largest religious buildings in southern Ukraine is “a striking fact in itself”, it is the authentic 19th century architecture that has the greatest historical value.
One is the House of Scientists, built in 1832 by Russian-Italian architect Francesco Carlo Boffo as an example of classicism in architecture and later purchased by Russian Count Mikhail Tolstoy. According to Dovgopolova, the building “embodies Odessa’s idea of patronage, entrepreneurship and innovation.”
“Thanks to the efforts of the Odesa Tolstoy family, the first ambulance station in the Russian Empire was launched (free for representatives of any social group), a public library was created, secondary educational institutions for women were launched,” Dovgopolova said. “The place housed a unique grand piano that once belonged to Franz Liszt, restored and made functional in recent years.”
explosions blown through windows and authentic fragments of stucco and plaster from the House of Scientists, damaging the original furnishings. “We need to assess the damage to the building because the problem may not only be due to blown windows, but also to a possible landslide,” added Dovgopolova. The blow destroyed the neighboring building located further down the slope, which may affect the stability of the House of Scientists. During World War II, a German missile damaged the house, but it survived this attack.
Following the attack, UNESCO issued two statements, pledge to send a mission to Odessa to assess the damage. UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay urged Russia “to take meaningful steps to comply” with the 1954 Hague Convention to protect cultural heritage during armed conflict. The historic center of Odessa was registered under UNESCO protection in January 2023 as an example of the cultural heritage of the Russian Empire and a vast area that has preserved the historic fabric of the city with its rapid development in the 19th century and its ethnically and culturally diverse population.
In the aftermath of the attack, residents gathered near the damaged sites to help clean up the rubble. Meanwhile, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni claims that Italy is ready “to get involved” in the reconstruction of the Cathedral of the Transfiguration after the Italian delegation of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Chamber of Deputies vilocated the place of the attack.
