Just when we thought 2009 would be a dry year for elitny club openings, along comes an international syndicate with a budget bigger than the Russian GDP. Welcome to the Moscow branch of Pacha. But only if you can get past Pasha first. Read full story
While Barack Obama brings hope to the United States, Dmitry Sokolov’s latest venture, Free Bar on Pokrovka Ul., offers cheap cocktails and big meals to Moscow huddled masses. Can we get hammered there for less than 1,000 rubles? Yes we can! Read full story
While the rest of Russia seeks to curb excessive drinking, Noch on Dubininskaya positively encourages it with a concept that’s almost as ingenious as it is dangerous: Once you’ve paid the cover charge drinks are free all night. Needless to say, we love it. Read full story
Punk’s not dead, it’s just been busy partying at Dima Ashman’s new project Kich-Kok on Petrovka Ul.: A place where a kaleidoscope of beautiful customers party to the best sound system in the city with Mohawk and tartan-clad bar staff. Read full story
Just like your local produkty, new club Evento in Gostiny Dvor promises to deliver around-the-clock alcohol and food. Also like your local produkty, you’ll find more people partying by the dumpster across the street than anywhere inside. Read full story
Where did it all go wrong? Escobar, the latest project from the promoter behind hugely successful nights at Garazh and Sorry, Babushka, is designed to cater for both your pre-party and after-party. Sadly, all it really serves up is quite a boring party. Read full story
Breaking things down, Russian culture is built on two liquid foundations: oil and alcohol. New club Neft on Oruzheiny Per. combines the two to deliriously debauched effect. Team element recounts what it can remember of their raucous opening night. Read full story
Halloween is when Moscow’s huddled masses come together for a drunken orgy of paganism, sex, drinking and silly costumes. You know, all those things that people like. So dust off your skimpiest costumes, you’re coming partying with element. Read full story
When Igor Chapurin opened his bar-boutique on Kuznetsky Most last month, it seemed like he was throwing down the gauntlet to Denis Simachyov. But it turns out their ideas about what constitutes fun differ as wildly as their ideas about fashion. Read full story
Zatura Bar on Pokrovka combines a gorgeous 19th-century decor aesthetic with sleek, modern ambience. This new Moscow nightspot just a few blocks away from Propaganda is a far cry from a dive bar but won’t give you a hard time at the door. Read full story
Balls to global warming! The polar ice caps aren’t melting, they’ve just been stolen to build new Ice Bar in the basement of TsUM. A place where the vodka runs cold, your nipples are rock hard and everyone around you is wearing valenki. Read full story
When element’s Helen Ashdown visited rapper Timati’s new club Black Star on the roof of the Yevropeisky mall she nearly vomited with disgust at how rubbish it was. Well, at least that means there’s plenty of room for improvement ... Read full story
Most people say they spend half their time getting drunk and the other half on the metro. Now thanks to new Metro Bar in the Renaissance Moscow Hotel they can experience doing both at the same time without the fear of getting pushed under a train. Read full story
Barkhat on Druzhinnikovskaya Ulitsa promises to offer something different to all the other clubs in Moscow. Although that remains to be seen, with its hot bar staff and irresistible interior, element’s Helen Ashdown couldn’t help but be impressed. Read full story
If there’s one thing you can trust an alcoholic to be right about, it’s where to find a great bar, and the original Floridita in Havana was Ernest Hemingway’s favorite drinking hole. element’s own alcoholic slurs approval of its new Moscow incarnation. Read full story
Despite, or perhaps because of, the fact that Famous on Rochdelskaya Ul. has followed the blueprint of some of the capital’s most successful elitny hot spots exactly to the letter, it feels like it’s got no soul. And it is now failing as a consequence. Read full story
Lazurny Bereg is the third incarnation in five years of the beach club inside Gorky Park. Although the name may invoke images of the beaches of the Cote d’Azur, the reality can sometimes be more like the rain-soaked rocks of Brighton pier. Read full story
Waterclub, a nightclub housed on a boat that cruises down the Moskva every Friday night, is a much more fun version of Captain Willard’s journey to Cambodia to kill Colonel Kurtz in “Apocalypse Now.” All it’s missing are enough clubbers to fill it. Read full story
You’ll need more than a dog-eared A-Z and a heightened sense of direction if you’re going to get into this week’s achingly cool club. You have to be in the know. Arma 17 is hidden in a disused gas factory and only comes out for special occasions. Read full story
Located just off Kuznetsky Most Bulvar, Shelter is a good hide out for some down-to-earth drinking and dancing — perfect for when you want to escape the elitny pretensions of nearby TsUM, GUM and all the shiny, glossy, plastic people inside them. Read full story
