Please note that the St. Mikhail Cathedral
wasn't named after Mikhail Kalashnikov!
The original temple construction was initiated back in 1893 by workers of the Izhevsk Arms Factory who had willingly been donating 1 kopeck from each ruble of their annual wages toward this purpose.
The original temple (later transformed to a cathedral) was designed in a style similar to the Cathedral of St. Basil the Blessed in Moscow, or The Church of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ in St. Petersburg.
Its main bell was cast from old cannons, and the reinforced bricks used in its construction had been pressure tested in labs of the Izhevsk Arms Factory. Seventeen copper crosses were also made at this factory; thus, the Izhevsk gunsmiths were closely involved with the project.
The building was finished in 1907 after 10 years of construction ... then later was ruined by the Bolsheviks in 1937. There was no better reason than the need for a source of building material - 882,780 of the cathedral's bricks were used to build the Medical College across the road from the Maiden of Kazan Church.
Images credit:
Pic.1-11: Wen-Hsiang Tsai, National Chiao Tung University (NCTU)
Pic.1-12: David Crawshaw, Wikipedia
Back in the year 2000, it was decided to recreate the St. Mikhail Cathedral within 5 years, and Maiden of Kazan Church, as part of the cathedral, was promptly built with generous financing from a local oil company.
As of February 2005, foundation of the main building has been finished.
