At the lecture by local historian and tour guide Irina Tykheeva we shall talk about Christmas, a favourite holiday in pre-revolutionary Russia, and its revised version in the USSR – New Year. We shall discuss how festive traditions were transformed after 1917, what is Communist Yuletide, godless masquerade, what metamorphoses the Christmas tree went through, how New Year's Eve was celebrated during the siege, in the post-war time and nowadays.