The book consists of a number of essays on the architecture of Moscow, which has not yet been sufficiently studied during the first half of the 18th century. The study has a specific bias. It involves the characterization of not only the monuments themselves, but also the personalities who directly initiated their creation, and in fact the co-authors - royal and possessing great opportunities of eminent customers - Peter I, Empresses Anna Ioannovna and Elizaveta Petrovna, A.D. Menshikov, brothers Gagarin, P.I. Yaguzhinsky, the Golovkin couple and others. The most important feature of the material involved is that, with the exception of a few heavily rebuilt and changed beyond recognition churches and palace buildings, the structures considered in the book have not existed for a long time. Realizing this, relying on graphic and written archival and museum sources, as well as attracting the memories of contemporaries, the author seeks to convey to the reader the appearance of a once existing city, immeasurably more full-blooded and colorful than the one that we observe today. In this regard, the book may be of interest not only to specialists, but to the widest circle of readers who honor Russian antiquity and Moscow memorials.