Here, in a small, non-longer standing, detached house, M. Bulgakov and L. Belozerskaya occupied two rooms from the end of June 1926 until August 1927. At that time, Bulgakov worked on the plays The Crimson Island and The Run.

Bulgakov’s second wife L. Belozerskaya remembered that they lived in two rooms – one blue and one yellow. The kitchen was shared and the house was completely full of tenants. Friends lived nearby – the Lyamin couple, S. Topleninov, V. Dolgoruky (Vladimirov) and S. Fedorchenko, as a guest of whom Bulgakov listened to Pasternak read verses from his poem Lieutenant Schmidt in 1926, and to many other friends and acquaintances. An endless stream of guests visited the Bulgakovs, where they played pranks and spent their evenings playing charades. Belozerskaya had two cats on behalf of whom Bulgakov left humourous notes to his wife (‘Our lovely papa has moved things around in our comfy flat. We are verrry pleased (and I Anshlag helped, papa almost crushed me when I was riding on the carrrrpet with my legs up in the airrr). Papa is so strong, all alone he dragged me, and is kind, he didn’t shout when he was getting red in the face, and now, mama, I’m sleeping on the sofa.’), and N. Ushakova and V. Dolgoruky even made a book by hand with drawings and poems called Muki-Maki (The Toils of Maka) about the Bulgakovs’ daily life on Maly Levshinsky (Maka was Bulgakov’s nickname at home).