The link between the Ministry of Finance and Soviet automobiles has a simple, almost ceremonial charm. For years a small circle of classic cars quietly gathered around the Ministry, a private tradition that grew into a small but devoted clan. And when such a celebration arrives, it becomes a moment to carry everything dear along with it, as if the journey itself were part of the tribute.
The ceremonial building of the modern Ministry of Finance on Ilyinka stands as a backdrop to these memories. In the foreground sits a ZIM GAZ-12, engine 3.5 liters, 90 horsepower, manual transmission. In today’s secondary market, about 15 units exist in various conditions, with prices ranging from around 500 thousand to 22 million rubles, depending on restoration, provenance, and originality.
Each automobile carries its own vivid history. A UAZ is said to have once been capable of parading down Red Square, while the iconic “rafik” most likely chauffeured guests during the Moscow Olympic Games of 1980. The collection brings together roughly twenty crews from across the country. Within it, AZLK and GAZ models are well represented, and VAZ is symbolically present through a single, exceptionally rare Natasha export convertible based on the G8 platform.
All cars have undergone careful restoration, are fully operational, tested on tracks, and have passed technical inspections—no contraindications prevent their use on public roads.
The Moskvich-401, often overheating at stoplights when pushing toward +31, found relief in quick fixes to the starting challenge. Sergei Viktorovich Ushakov, an owner of the Moskvich-401 from 1954, previously held leadership positions in the USSR Motorsport Federation and later in the Russian Automobile Federation, underscoring the tight links between sport, administration, and automobile culture.
A view of Moscow from the cockpit of a Moskvich-401 confirms that the city’s spirit remains recognizable even as time moves forward. While some cars faced unusual heat-related issues, most operations ran smoothly and minor concerns were resolved efficiently.
The pit stop at the Narkomfin House recalls a landmark of early Soviet modernism. Built between 1928 and 1930, it embraced a bold notion of one family per apartment and an architectural layout designed to support workers in finance and public service. Today the building has been restored and continues to serve its original purpose, available for purchase or rental as part of Moscow’s historic fabric.
Against the backdrop of the Presidium building of the USSR Academy of Sciences (now the Russian Academy of Sciences) and the Golden Brains complex, a Seagull GAZ-14 stands out with a 5.5-liter engine delivering 220 horsepower in automatic configuration. In the secondary market, chassis with units but no body fetch prices as low as 120,000 rubles, illustrating the varied market for these cars as relics and pieces of history.
The line of cars moved in a disciplined procession, passing memorials of the capital. A symbolic stop at the Narkomfin House on Novinsky Boulevard highlighted the building’s role as a monument to Soviet avant-garde and constructivist ideas, a reminder of how architecture and automotive culture once intersected in daily life.
Andrey Pankovsky, co-organizer of the event, drove a Volga GAZ-3111. This model, produced in modest numbers—about 420 units—was rarer than Natasha to begin with, and today only a handful are offered on the secondary market, underscoring the rarity of such pieces in the current era.
Toward the event’s finale, participants staged symbolic driving-precision challenges, such as stopping the rear wheel on a designated white area. Alexei Kuleshov’s Lada Natasha performed well, a car that had seen production in Germany and Belgium with a total run of roughly 450 pieces. Today, Natasha is hardly represented on secondary markets, adding to its aura and collectability.
Many of the era’s treasures carried a sense of money and status, a reminder that what might have been enough to buy Chaika in the past now requires additional resources to acquire. The tour also included a visit to the historic Gokhran building near the Borodino panorama, and concluded at a Lenin monument in Luzhniki where a grand celebration program filled the air with nostalgia and pride.
For readers who want a quick, ongoing briefing, the experience of this journey can also be shared via messaging platforms like Viber, where selected notes about the drive are compiled in concise narratives. This is a story of heritage, engineering, and the way a nation’s public institutions and private passion can intersect in the most unexpected ways, creating a living museum on wheels that still moves today as a testament to an era of design and ambition. For those who seek to learn more about these machines, publications and collections offer a window into the era’s engineering language and the cultural context that shaped them. Citation: Soviet automotive history and archival records provide broader context for the models, dates, and restorations described here.