The memorial office of Sergei Prokofiev is designed in a way to look exactly like Prokofiev’s office during his lifetime. This apartment on Kamergerskiy Pereulok in Moscow was where the composer worked on new compositions and hosted friends and visitors in the last years of his life.

According to Prokofiev’s relatives, the most essential elements of the composer’s office were a piano, a desk, and a comfortable chair. Prokofiev loved his room with a large writing desk. His mother Maria Grigoryevna recalled that Sergei enjoyed spending time at his desk from a very early age. The composer also mentioned it in his autobiography, “Mother wrote to father, ‘Serezha is very pleased with his room. He holes up in it and spends all his time at his desk.’ This fondness for my desk was one I acquired early and have retained all my life.” This is hardly surprising since silence and concentration are essential for the most important composing processes.

One of Prokofiev’s extraordinary professional skills was the ability to compose without having any instrument at hand: he worked on the most sophisticated musical ideas for his composition in absolute silence. This is why he needed a cozy chair to sit in while meditating on his ideas and a comfortable desk for writing them down. He also required a piano to play and rehearse with musicians who visited Prokofiev at his apartment on Kamergerskiy Pereulok.

Sergei Prokofiev lived at 6 Kamergerskiy Pereulok from 1947 until his death in 1953. The apartment belonged to the parents of the composer’s second wife Mira Mendelson-Prokofieva. This is where the composer wrote his ballet “The Stone Flower” and his last Seventh Symphony.