herb chambers yacht price

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EXCELLENCE Yacht – Supreme $120 Million Superyacht

EXCELLENCE yacht is one of the largest superyachts in the world with a total length of 80 meters (262.5 ft).

She is often considered a masterpiece of design with her unusual reversed bow.

EXCELLENCE yacht interior

The interior of the EXCELLENCE yacht was designed by Andrew Winch, an English yacht designer specializing in the luxurious and unusual design.

The yacht perfectly combines indoor and outdoor living with her three-story glass atrium that allows the interior to be bright and open.

Fourteen guests find space on board in seven cabins, as well as a crew of 20 who have a designated area below deck. The interior of the yacht is decorated in beige and creme tones, perfectly complimented by dark wooden elements.

There is a cinema, spa with a sauna, and gym aboard EXCELLENCE and the aft of the vessel holds a large beach club with direct water access.

Specifications

The EXCELLENCE yacht has a length of 80 meters (262.5 ft), a beam of 14.45 meters (47.4 ft), and a draft of 3.45m (11.3 ft).

Her twin MTU engines allow her to reach top speeds of 17 knots, although her average cruising speed lies at 14 knots. She carries 30,000 liters of water and 50,000 liters of diesel on board.

The EXCELLENCE yacht is the 7th largest yacht built by ​​the renowned German shipyard Abeking & Rasmussen.

Her exterior was designed by Andrew Winch, who also worked on the interior of EXCELLENCE.

Her most unusual feature is definitely the reversed bow that is sure to catch the attention of onlookers anywhere she docks.

She has plenty of deck space that can be used for sunbathing or covered up with awnings if required.

On the main deck, a pool with a swim-up bar allows guests to relax and unwind. EXCELLENCE has a sizeable aluminum superstructure and an elongated steel hull.

She has unusually large windows which allow the interior to be flooded with natural light. 

The owner bought EXCELLENCE for a price of US$120 million in 2019. She generates annual running costs of US $5 to 12 million depending on use.

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Herb Chambers Yacht: Everything You Want To Know

Herb Chambers is an American businessman and a billionaire known for his massive New England and East coast auto dealership empire, the Herb Chambers Companies. His net worth is believed to be somewhere close to $2 billion and, as a man who clearly likes fancy cars and other luxurious things, he spared no expense when it came to buying his own personal yacht back in 2019. The vessel was built by yacht makers Abeking Rasmussen and designed by Winch Design. It quickly became a famous, award winning new yacht thanks to its complicated naval architecture and sleek superyacht design.

What is Herb Chambers Yacht Called?

Chambers chose to call his yacht Excellence which, all things being equal, is certainly an appropriate name for this luxury vessel. Captain Ray Shore, who has been Chambers’ yacht captain for 30 years, is the man behind the wheel. We’ll get into some of what we know about its impressive features and amenities soon that really show off why it deserves the title. 

How Much Did Herb Chambers’ Yacht Cost?

Excellence is rumored to have set Herb Chambers back a whopping $120 million. No wonder Excellence is in the name. That’s not close to the most expensive yacht in the world, but it does put the yacht in the top 30 most expensive in the world. On top of the base cost that Chambers spent to take this vessel home there’s also the annual running cost. Most of us don’t consider this when we think about yacht expenses but the cost of running a superyacht can be absolutely staggering. It’s estimated that, when you account for fuel as well as operating costs like paying the crew, food and other necessities on board, Chambers is spending between $5 million and $12 million per year. 

What Does it Cost To Charter Excellent?

Chambers has made Excellence available for charter and, in fact, he has had several previous yachts also called Excellence. Some of these yachts, of which there have been six, can be chartered as well though most of them have since been renamed. As you might expect, the vessel does not come cheap by any means. If you’re interested, a week will cost $1,150,000, which is one of the most expensive charters you’re likely to find anywhere.

Chambers has gone on record saying having the boat available for charter is important to him because it just costs too much to keep it running. He likes owning it but he doesn’t like paying for it and, really, you can’t fault him for his reasoning. He says, for him, that’s where he finds value in it. It’s worth something to own if he can have it chartered out and make the cost of running it back, which is good business. 

How Big is Herb Chambers Yacht Excellence?

Excellence definitely falls under the realm of superyachts. It clocks in at a very impressive 80 meters which works out to about 263 feet in length. That means it’s quite a bit larger than your average yacht, though still a good deal smaller than the mega yachts owned by the likes of Jeff Bezos and Bill Gates.

The largest yachts in the world are, in some cases, twice as big as Chambers’ yacht so it’s by no means the biggest out there. Still, for an individual yacht, this 263-foot monster with a 47.4 foot draft and a gross tonnage of 2,115 tons is by no means small.

The yacht is designed to accommodate up to 14 passengers (though some sources claim 12, despite their being seven cabins) as well as 20 crew (but, again, some sources say 22, though there seem to be just 10 crew cabins).

What is the Cruising Speed of Herb Chambers Yacht?

Despite its size, the Excellence still has a pretty standard cruising speed of around 14 knots. It’s powered by a pair of twin 2,029hp MTU (12V 4000 M65R) diesel engines that can get it up to a top speed of 17 knots. Based on that, Excellence has a range of up to 6,300 nautical miles thanks to her 150,000 liter fuel tanks at cruising speed.

What’s the Interior of Herb Chambers Excellence Yacht Like?

One of the most unique and easily recognizable features of Excellence is the bow. Unlike your average vessel, Excellence is sporting a reverse bow and elongated hull which gives the boat the visual appearance of being upside down in the water, at least at the front. Beyond that, there’s also an extremely hard to miss triple-height glass atrium in the center of the yacht. As you can imagine, this enormous glass centerpiece allows the interior to be flooded with natural light while also allowing for amazing views of the outside from all over the vessel.

Throughout the vessel you’ll find much more glass as well as ample marble and Italian leather. There’s also wood accents of sycamore, burr, limed oak, blue ombre and birdseye maple to give it natural and opulent touches.

The top deck of the yacht is actually the private owner’s suite so it features not just the master bedroom suite but a number of other private amenities. To the aft is a sun deck lounging area only accessible to the owner and invited guests. Head forward and you’ll find your private terrace There’s also access to a private deck jacuzzi as well to ensure that, if you want, you can spend your time in luxury fully away from all the other guests.

The entire, luxury master suite also features floor to ceiling mirrored glass. That allows those inside to have a beautiful 180-degree view of the ocean and surroundings while also being obscured from anyone else looking in. In terms of size, at one point this mirror glass wall rises to a height of 6 whole meters or about 18 feet. 

Above the owner’s deck you’ll find a large sun lounging area with another jacuzzi. However, if you want to make the most of your time relaxing in the water then head to the main deck where there’s an entire swimming pool which also features a swim up bar. 

For most guests, the main deck is where they are spending most of their time. There are 6 double guest cabins located there plus a lot more. A lounge and dining area can manage the full complement of guests plus extras who may be hanging out for a party. In addition there is a fully appointed gym as well as a spa and sauna for use.

Elsewhere on the main deck, guests can enjoy a movie in the cinema space. If it’s a nice day and guests want to head out for fun on the water then heading down below deck is where you want to be.

A large beach club space has a terrace so you can really get out to lounge or enjoy the water. The garage is packed with more toys than you’d think possible. Check out this list of what’s available on board.

• One 9.8m/32’2″ Hogdon limousine tender, for when you want to head ashore in style
• Two standard tenders
• An Angeboat RS 200 two-person sailing dinghy
• A trampoline
• An inflatable platform
• An aquapark
• A pair of sea kayaks
• A pair of sea bobs
• A pair of Yamaha VX cruiser waverunners
• A training center that can actually teach you how to ride waverunners
• Four stand up paddle boards
• Inflatable, towable toys
• Gear for both snorkeling and scuba diving

The Bottom Line

Billionaire Herb Chambers owns the yacht known as Excellence, which is actually one of six yachts he’s owned that all bore the same name. The vessel is believed to have cost him $120 million in 2019 and has an annual running cost of between $5 million and $12 million. To offset those costs, Chambers charters the yacht which costs over $1 million per week for those interested.

One of the most distinguishing and recognizable features of the superyacht Excellence is the reverse bow. The superyacht owner wanted this so it would be clearly different from his previous boat. It also has some of the largest windows you’ll ever see on a yacht, reaching nearly 20 feet in some places.  

Excellence has room for about 20 crew and 14 guests, though these numbers seem to vary. It features a swimming pool, two Jacuzzis and a number of toys.

My grandfather first took me fishing when I was too young to actually hold up a rod on my own. As an avid camper, hiker, and nature enthusiast I'm always looking for a new adventure.

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Billionaire Auto Dealer to Buy Guo Wengui’s Yacht for $24 Million

By Alex Wolf

Billionaire auto dealership mogul Herb Chambers agreed to purchase the Lady May, a luxury yacht upon which Trump adviser Steve Bannon was arrested in 2020, from the bankruptcy estate of federally-indicted Chinese exile Guo Wengui.

Herb Chambers Yachting LLC, a company owned by the eponymous businessman, submitted the winning bid of $24 million to buy the 150-foot vessel out of Chapter 11, according to filings Friday in the US Bankruptcy Court for the District of Connecticut.

The private sale agreement “represents the highest and best bid obtained after an extensive marketing campaign” and competitive bidding process that began in late ...

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Boat of the Week: This Speedy 153-Foot Superyacht Has Its Own Turbo Boost

Push a button and the turbine kicks in, which is yachting's equivalent of light speed., julia zaltzman, julia zaltzman's most recent stories.

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What do you get if you have two friends with a passion for boats, high-profile automotive careers and cash to burn? The answer is the 153-foot superyacht Excellence , a vessel that oozes speed, has brand pedigree and captures the hearts of all who own it.

Built in 2001 by Formula One racing car driver and automobile entrepreneur Roger Penske, who named her  Detroit Eagle , the yacht combined Feadship ’s Dutch craftsmanship with Penske’s own brand of engine. (Disclosure: Roger Penske is the father of Jay Penske, who owns this publication, as well as its sister publications in the Penske Media portfolio.)

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“At the time [Roger] Penske owned a company called Detroit Diesel that made diesel engines for boats, and he was also involved with a company that built turbine engines,” current owner and Penske’s longtime friend, Herb Chambers, told Robb Report . “So, he went to Feadship and built a lightweight aluminum yacht with a shallow draft to demonstrate the capability of his engines.”

The Feadship was originally built and owned for years by Roger Penske, who wanted a very fast, very luxurious superyacht. Penske installed his own Detroit Diesel-branded engines and then added a 5,600-hp turbine to give the yacht a 10-knot pop at the top end.  Courtesy of Burgess Yachts

The immaculate, polished-chrome engine room, with the diesels painted in fire-engine red, has always been a symbolic indicator of the type of impressive speeds the yacht can reach. The engines are 16-cylinder 4000 series, which generate 3,650 horsepower each. Penske then added something the superyacht world had never seen before–a Lycoming TF-50 gas turbine for an additional 5,600 horsepower.

“The boat can cruise at about 23 knots on diesel engines,” Chambers says, “but if you really want it to go fast, you push a button and the turbine kicks in taking the boat from 23 knots up to around 33 knots. It really is a remarkable vessel.”

Serial boat builder Chambers grew up in the Boston area, spending long summers on the water at his grandmother’s cottage. “I always had the desire to have a boat,” he says, a goal he realized at 24 with a 30-foot Trojan flybridge motoryacht. The Trojan would be the first of five yachts called A-Copy , named after his successful copy-machine business.

“After I sold the copy company and had this windfall of money, I ordered a 127-foot Feadship. The name A-Copy wasn’t of any significance to me anymore so I tried to think of a name that I would like,” Chambers says. “I’m not an avid reader, but I read Tom Peters’s book In Search of Excellence and loved it. It’s about running a good business. I thought Excellence , that is a great name for a boat.”

Launched last summer, Chambers’s newest 262-foot Abeking & Rasmussen “Excellence” has a futuristic hull shape, with an eagle-beak bow and large glass panels on the exterior.  Courtesy Abeking & Rasmussen

To date, Chambers has owned more than 40 yachts of many sizes. Some were even sold before he took delivery. The name “Excellence” serves as a constant reminder to his 30-year-long captain for the need to maintain high standards on board, he says. It has also carried through to Chamber’s six most recent yachts. This includes his largest yacht to date, a striking 262-foot Abeking & Rasmussen launched in 2019, on which he enjoys cruising the European waters of Croatia, Greece, Italy and St Tropez. That Excellence won Robb Report ’s 2020 Best of the Best award for interiors.

With its “eagle” reverse bow and triple-height glass atrium, the Winch-designed yacht turns heads wherever it goes. But that’s hardly surprising considering Philip Starck’s opinion-dividing Motor Yacht A was the design inspiration this latest Excellence .

“When I first saw Motor Yacht A , I said, ‘That looks like a submarine. Who would ever want to have a boat like that?’ And the second time I saw it, I said, ‘That boat is pretty nice. I kinda like that bow.’ And the third time I saw it, I thought, ‘I absolutely love that.’ So, that’s where the idea for Excellence ’s bow came from.”

While he has recently listed the Feadship “Excellence,” Chambers plans to enjoy the yacht for while he still owns her. He has often owned two yachts—the newer one that is often under charter, and a smaller, faster one that is at his disposal for his “personal use.” 

While Chambers’s appreciation of Feadship has long endured after his first foray with the Dutch shipbuilder, it wasn’t until a 2018 visit to Fort Lauderdale Boat Show that Penske’s 153-foot yacht caught Chamber’s eye. Prized by Chambers for its flexible speed and six-foot Bahamas-friendly draft, it is one of the few yachts that he hasn’t put on the charter market.

“I view the Feadship as a very personal boat,” says Chambers. “It’s only a four-stateroom boat, but you can bring three other couples or family members with you. When I told Roger Penske that I had bought the boat, he said his family was mad at him when he sold it because they loved it so much.”

An extensive 2019 refit of the yacht includes a full paint job, an updated sound system and refurb of the original John Munford interior. Chambers bought the yacht for his own personal use. “Because my boats get chartered, I always love to have a boat that’s available just for me,” Chambers says. “I built a 94-foot Mangusta for that purpose and used it in America when my big yacht was on charter in the Mediterranean or Caribbean. The Feadship can do pretty much what the Mangusta did, but it’s a bigger, more comfortable boat, so I sold the Mangusta at the start of 2020.”

The 2001 build has undergone a complete refurbishment of the interior. 

Being a serial owner, Chambers also recently listed the updated Feadship. He plans to enjoy the yacht while she is still available. Will he miss this Excellence ?

“I really don’t know,” Chambers says, pausing. “I would maybe look to build a similar boat, around 150 feet, something that would be fast. But the Abeking & Rasmussen Excellence is still new to me. The time for me to sell a boat is when I still like it.”

That creates a great opportunity for a buyer who wants a piece of superyacht history–a very fast superyacht history.

Excellence is co-listed for sale with Burgess  and Merle Wood & Associates for $16,900,000. Here are more views.

Images Courtesy of Burgess Yachts

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Superyacht Influencer Interview: Herb Chambers Opens Up About Owning 263-Foot-Long EXCELLENCE

I’ve never met anyone in the superyacht world quite like herb chambers..

Superyacht owners are often, um, how should we say it…pretty aloof. And I can’t say I blame them. But every now and then, I meet a superyacht owner who loves his new yacht, loves the process of designing and building something so unique, and appreciates the incredibly talented designers and engineers and builders who can make his dreams a reality so much that he’s willing to share some of the experience with me–on the record.

But I’ve never met anyone in the superyacht world quite like the owner of 263-foot-long EXCELLENCE, which was designed by Winch Design, built by Abeking & Rasmussen, and won the “Best Exterior Design” and “Finest New Superyacht” awards at the Monaco Yacht Show .

He’s a straight-talking American whose smiling face and common sense one-liners are on nearly every billboard near where I live in downtown Boston. His name is Herb Chambers. And he’s on all those billboards because he owns (and is the face of) more than 1,000 car dealerships in New England that bear his name.

“Well, I’ve had six yachts,” he says when I ask about how he came to own one of the hottest superyachts in the world. “I built two in Holland and then I started building them in Germany at Abeking & Rassmussen.”

“Why so many?” I ask. 

“It’s fun to build a boat,” he says with a twinkle in his eye. “As a matter of fact, from my standpoint, it’s probably more fun to build them than it is to use them.”

“You’re creating something. You’re watching something grow,” he continues. “I think people who develop real estate know what I’m talking about; watching a project grow.”

“I’m in the automobile business, so it’s not quite the same. But building a boat gives you an excuse to go to Europe every three or four months so you see the progress and what’s going on at the yard. And that, to me, is very exciting.”

“Then, you have the opportunity to make a lot of choices.”

When it comes to EXCELLENCE ’s design, “choices” may be a bit of an understatement. Chambers’ design brief called for his new yacht to be “extraordinary” and to create a seamless feeling of openness and connection to the outside world. He says, “I also wanted the boat to be what I’ll call a ‘happy boat’. There are many boats out there that are overdone. They become an exercise in excess. I didn’t want that.”

He just needed to meet the designer that could create what he wanted.

“So how did you decide to build such a radical new yacht?” I ask.

“We were at a boat show when I still owned my previous EXCELLENCE (a 198-footer also named EXCELLENCE and built by Abeking & Rasmussen), but I was thinking about building something new. Then I walked into the Abeking & Rasmussen stand. And they had a rendering on the wall. And he–” Chambers says, pointing at the man who just sat next to him at the bar on the lower deck of his award-winning new yacht where we are sitting, “had done the rendering.”

The “he” Chambers refers to is Andrew Winch, the founder of Winch Design and the head of the design team that designed every element of the yacht, from the striking exterior and complicated naval architecture to every detail in the interior.

“I was thinking about a boat with lots of glass. And then I stopped and said, ‘I like that boat,’” he explains, pointing at a rendering that was just a concept Abeking & Rasmussen and Winch Design were collaborating on. Soon Chambers was making changes and making his own additions to the design. And not too long after that, the boat was being built.

Winch describes the process with Chambers like this: “Herb trusted us to design and build something that was so new, it was way beyond the comfort zone of most people. He had the courage to do it.”

In fact, the team at Winch Design came up with a superstructure that’s so unique, it’s no wonder EXCELLENCE has been so well-received. The instantly identifiable reverse bow and the yacht’s profile built around huge areas of mirrored and curved floor-to-ceiling glass executed brilliantly by Abeking & Rassmussen may point to where the future of superyacht design and construction is headed.

What’s more? We can help you charter it for yourself! 

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In Transit: Notes from the Underground

Jun 06 2018.

Spend some time in one of Moscow’s finest museums.

Subterranean commuting might not be anyone’s idea of a good time, but even in a city packing the war-games treasures and priceless bejeweled eggs of the Kremlin Armoury and the colossal Soviet pavilions of the VDNKh , the Metro holds up as one of Moscow’s finest museums. Just avoid rush hour.

The Metro is stunning and provides an unrivaled insight into the city’s psyche, past and present, but it also happens to be the best way to get around. Moscow has Uber, and the Russian version called Yandex Taxi , but also some nasty traffic. Metro trains come around every 90 seconds or so, at a more than 99 percent on-time rate. It’s also reasonably priced, with a single ride at 55 cents (and cheaper in bulk). From history to tickets to rules — official and not — here’s what you need to know to get started.

A Brief Introduction Buying Tickets Know Before You Go (Down) Rules An Easy Tour

A Brief Introduction

Moscow’s Metro was a long time coming. Plans for rapid transit to relieve the city’s beleaguered tram system date back to the Imperial era, but a couple of wars and a revolution held up its development. Stalin revived it as part of his grand plan to modernize the Soviet Union in the 1920s and 30s. The first lines and tunnels were constructed with help from engineers from the London Underground, although Stalin’s secret police decided that they had learned too much about Moscow’s layout and had them arrested on espionage charges and deported.

The beauty of its stations (if not its trains) is well-documented, and certainly no accident. In its illustrious first phases and particularly after the Second World War, the greatest architects of Soviet era were recruited to create gleaming temples celebrating the Revolution, the USSR, and the war triumph. No two stations are exactly alike, and each of the classic showpieces has a theme. There are world-famous shrines to Futurist architecture, a celebration of electricity, tributes to individuals and regions of the former Soviet Union. Each marble slab, mosaic tile, or light fixture was placed with intent, all in service to a station’s aesthetic; each element, f rom the smallest brass ear of corn to a large blood-spattered sword on a World War II mural, is an essential part of the whole.

The Metro is a monument to the Soviet propaganda project it was intended to be when it opened in 1935 with the slogan “Building a Palace for the People”. It brought the grand interiors of Imperial Russia to ordinary Muscovites, celebrated the Soviet Union’s past achievements while promising its citizens a bright Soviet future, and of course, it was a show-piece for the world to witness the might and sophistication of life in the Soviet Union.

It may be a museum, but it’s no relic. U p to nine million people use it daily, more than the London Underground and New York Subway combined. (Along with, at one time, about 20 stray dogs that learned to commute on the Metro.)

In its 80+ year history, the Metro has expanded in phases and fits and starts, in step with the fortunes of Moscow and Russia. Now, partly in preparation for the World Cup 2018, it’s also modernizing. New trains allow passengers to walk the entire length of the train without having to change carriages. The system is becoming more visitor-friendly. (There are helpful stickers on the floor marking out the best selfie spots .) But there’s a price to modernity: it’s phasing out one of its beloved institutions, the escalator attendants. Often they are middle-aged or elderly women—“ escalator grandmas ” in news accounts—who have held the post for decades, sitting in their tiny kiosks, scolding commuters for bad escalator etiquette or even bad posture, or telling jokes . They are slated to be replaced, when at all, by members of the escalator maintenance staff.

For all its achievements, the Metro lags behind Moscow’s above-ground growth, as Russia’s capital sprawls ever outwards, generating some of the world’s worst traffic jams . But since 2011, the Metro has been in the middle of an ambitious and long-overdue enlargement; 60 new stations are opening by 2020. If all goes to plan, the 2011-2020 period will have brought 125 miles of new tracks and over 100 new stations — a 40 percent increase — the fastest and largest expansion phase in any period in the Metro’s history.

Facts: 14 lines Opening hours: 5 a.m-1 a.m. Rush hour(s): 8-10 a.m, 4-8 p.m. Single ride: 55₽ (about 85 cents) Wi-Fi network-wide

Buying Tickets

• Ticket machines have a button to switch to English.
• You can buy specific numbers of rides: 1, 2, 5, 11, 20, or 60. Hold up fingers to show how many rides you want to buy.
• There is also a 90-minute ticket , which gets you 1 trip on the metro plus an unlimited number of transfers on other transport (bus, tram, etc) within 90 minutes.
• Or, you can buy day tickets with unlimited rides: one day (218₽/ US$4), three days (415₽/US$7) or seven days (830₽/US$15). Check the rates here to stay up-to-date.
• If you’re going to be using the Metro regularly over a few days, it’s worth getting a Troika card , a contactless, refillable card you can use on all public transport. Using the Metro is cheaper with one of these: a single ride is 36₽, not 55₽. Buy them and refill them in the Metro stations, and they’re valid for 5 years, so you can keep it for next time. Or, if you have a lot of cash left on it when you leave, you can get it refunded at the Metro Service Centers at Ulitsa 1905 Goda, 25 or at Staraya Basmannaya 20, Building 1.
• You can also buy silicone bracelets and keychains with built-in transport chips that you can use as a Troika card. (A Moscow Metro Fitbit!) So far, you can only get these at the Pushkinskaya metro station Live Helpdesk and souvenir shops in the Mayakovskaya and Trubnaya metro stations. The fare is the same as for the Troika card.
• You can also use Apple Pay and Samsung Pay.

Rules, spoken and unspoken

No smoking, no drinking, no filming, no littering. Photography is allowed, although it used to be banned.

Stand to the right on the escalator. Break this rule and you risk the wrath of the legendary escalator attendants. (No shenanigans on the escalators in general.)

Get out of the way. Find an empty corner to hide in when you get off a train and need to stare at your phone. Watch out getting out of the train in general; when your train doors open, people tend to appear from nowhere or from behind ornate marble columns, walking full-speed.

Always offer your seat to elderly ladies (what are you, a monster?).

An Easy Tour

This is no Metro Marathon ( 199 stations in 20 hours ). It’s an easy tour, taking in most—though not all—of the notable stations, the bulk of it going clockwise along the Circle line, with a couple of short detours. These stations are within minutes of one another, and the whole tour should take about 1-2 hours.

Start at Mayakovskaya Metro station , at the corner of Tverskaya and Garden Ring,  Triumfalnaya Square, Moskva, Russia, 125047.

1. Mayakovskaya.  Named for Russian Futurist Movement poet Vladimir Mayakovsky and an attempt to bring to life the future he imagined in his poems. (The Futurist Movement, natch, was all about a rejecting the past and celebrating all things speed, industry, modern machines, youth, modernity.) The result: an Art Deco masterpiece that won the National Grand Prix for architecture at the New York World’s Fair in 1939. It’s all smooth, rounded shine and light, and gentle arches supported by columns of dark pink marble and stainless aircraft steel. Each of its 34 ceiling niches has a mosaic. During World War II, the station was used as an air-raid shelter and, at one point, a bunker for Stalin. He gave a subdued but rousing speech here in Nov. 6, 1941 as the Nazis bombed the city above.

Take the 3/Green line one station to:

2. Belorusskaya. Opened in 1952, named after the connected Belarussky Rail Terminal, which runs trains between Moscow and Belarus. This is a light marble affair with a white, cake-like ceiling, lined with Belorussian patterns and 12 Florentine ceiling mosaics depicting life in Belarussia when it was built.

Transfer onto the 1/Brown line. Then, one stop (clockwise) t o:

3. Novoslobodskaya.  This station was designed around the stained-glass panels, which were made in Latvia, because Alexey Dushkin, the Soviet starchitect who dreamed it up (and also designed Mayakovskaya station) couldn’t find the glass and craft locally. The stained glass is the same used for Riga’s Cathedral, and the panels feature plants, flowers, members of the Soviet intelligentsia (musician, artist, architect) and geometric shapes.

Go two stops east on the 1/Circle line to:

4. Komsomolskaya. Named after the Komsomol, or the Young Communist League, this might just be peak Stalin Metro style. Underneath the hub for three regional railways, it was intended to be a grand gateway to Moscow and is today its busiest station. It has chandeliers; a yellow ceiling with Baroque embellishments; and in the main hall, a colossal red star overlaid on golden, shimmering tiles. Designer Alexey Shchusev designed it as an homage to the speech Stalin gave at Red Square on Nov. 7, 1941, in which he invoked Russia’s illustrious military leaders as a pep talk to Soviet soldiers through the first catastrophic year of the war.   The station’s eight large mosaics are of the leaders referenced in the speech, such as Alexander Nevsky, a 13th-century prince and military commander who bested German and Swedish invading armies.

One more stop clockwise to Kurskaya station,  and change onto the 3/Blue  line, and go one stop to:

5. Baumanskaya.   Opened in 1944. Named for the Bolshevik Revolutionary Nikolai Bauman , whose monument and namesake district are aboveground here. Though he seemed like a nasty piece of work (he apparently once publicly mocked a woman he had impregnated, who later hung herself), he became a Revolutionary martyr when he was killed in 1905 in a skirmish with a monarchist, who hit him on the head with part of a steel pipe. The station is in Art Deco style with atmospherically dim lighting, and a series of bronze sculptures of soldiers and homefront heroes during the War. At one end, there is a large mosaic portrait of Lenin.

Stay on that train direction one more east to:

6. Elektrozavodskaya. As you may have guessed from the name, this station is the Metro’s tribute to all thing electrical, built in 1944 and named after a nearby lightbulb factory. It has marble bas-relief sculptures of important figures in electrical engineering, and others illustrating the Soviet Union’s war-time struggles at home. The ceiling’s recurring rows of circular lamps give the station’s main tunnel a comforting glow, and a pleasing visual effect.

Double back two stops to Kurskaya station , and change back to the 1/Circle line. Sit tight for six stations to:

7. Kiyevskaya. This was the last station on the Circle line to be built, in 1954, completed under Nikita Khrushchev’ s guidance, as a tribute to his homeland, Ukraine. Its three large station halls feature images celebrating Ukraine’s contributions to the Soviet Union and Russo-Ukrainian unity, depicting musicians, textile-working, soldiers, farmers. (One hall has frescoes, one mosaics, and the third murals.) Shortly after it was completed, Khrushchev condemned the architectural excesses and unnecessary luxury of the Stalin era, which ushered in an epoch of more austere Metro stations. According to the legend at least, he timed the policy in part to ensure no Metro station built after could outshine Kiyevskaya.

Change to the 3/Blue line and go one stop west.

8. Park Pobedy. This is the deepest station on the Metro, with one of the world’s longest escalators, at 413 feet. If you stand still, the escalator ride to the surface takes about three minutes .) Opened in 2003 at Victory Park, the station celebrates two of Russia’s great military victories. Each end has a mural by Georgian artist Zurab Tsereteli, who also designed the “ Good Defeats Evil ” statue at the UN headquarters in New York. One mural depicts the Russian generals’ victory over the French in 1812 and the other, the German surrender of 1945. The latter is particularly striking; equal parts dramatic, triumphant, and gruesome. To the side, Red Army soldiers trample Nazi flags, and if you look closely there’s some blood spatter among the detail. Still, the biggest impressions here are the marble shine of the chessboard floor pattern and the pleasingly geometric effect if you view from one end to the other.

Keep going one more stop west to:

9. Slavyansky Bulvar.  One of the Metro’s youngest stations, it opened in 2008. With far higher ceilings than many other stations—which tend to have covered central tunnels on the platforms—it has an “open-air” feel (or as close to it as you can get, one hundred feet under). It’s an homage to French architect Hector Guimard, he of the Art Nouveau entrances for the Paris M é tro, and that’s precisely what this looks like: A Moscow homage to the Paris M é tro, with an additional forest theme. A Cyrillic twist on Guimard’s Metro-style lettering over the benches, furnished with t rees and branch motifs, including creeping vines as towering lamp-posts.

Stay on the 3/Blue line and double back four stations to:

10. Arbatskaya. Its first iteration, Arbatskaya-Smolenskaya station, was damaged by German bombs in 1941. It was rebuilt in 1953, and designed to double as a bomb shelter in the event of nuclear war, although unusually for stations built in the post-war phase, this one doesn’t have a war theme. It may also be one of the system’s most elegant: Baroque, but toned down a little, with red marble floors and white ceilings with gilded bronze c handeliers.

Jump back on the 3/Blue line  in the same direction and take it one more stop:

11. Ploshchad Revolyutsii (Revolution Square). Opened in 1938, and serving Red Square and the Kremlin . Its renowned central hall has marble columns flanked by 76 bronze statues of Soviet heroes: soldiers, students, farmers, athletes, writers, parents. Some of these statues’ appendages have a yellow sheen from decades of Moscow’s commuters rubbing them for good luck. Among the most popular for a superstitious walk-by rub: the snout of a frontier guard’s dog, a soldier’s gun (where the touch of millions of human hands have tapered the gun barrel into a fine, pointy blade), a baby’s foot, and a woman’s knee. (A brass rooster also sports the telltale gold sheen, though I am told that rubbing the rooster is thought to bring bad luck. )

Now take the escalator up, and get some fresh air.

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