Thanks to Covid-19, construction dragged into 2022, finishing in February — just in time for Russia to invade Ukraine. The following month, McDonald’s suspended operations in Russia, and by May, it had exited the market entirely, selling all of its assets to Alexander Govor, a mining oligarch. The Pushkin Square restaurant is now a gleaming new fast food chain Vkusno i tochka (“tasty, period”) that slings Big Specials under a vaguely familiar orangey M.
Not long ago, McDonald’s flagship restaurant in Moscow completed a truly ill-timed remodelling. A powerful brand symbol and tourist draw, Russia’s first location and, for many years, the world’s busiest, the store opened in busy Pushkin Square in 1990, when the plaza was still Soviet. The flagship stayed resolutely Golden Arch-y for decades until the company announced in 2020 that it would be modernised to commemorate its 30th anniversary.
The new look was supposed to reveal “recognisable neutrality”, according to the designers. The red and yellow interior accents came down; earth-toned concrete, stainless steel and wood appeared in their place. The pièce de résistance was the new facade intended to blend McDonald’s and Moscow into “a single space” visually, with a two-story wall of mirrored glass that reflected the square’s activity to passers-by.
