The underground and the seven sisters skyscrapers were built in the early 50s as the country recovered from the war. They are truly impressive, overblown, gaudy, muscular heroic, idealised and rather vulgar. And underpinning them is the knowledge that they were built on the profits of Gulag slave labour, and massive misallocation of resources for national vanity projects, while people lived in prefabs and tents, and couldn't get milk for their children.