his palace in Gulripsh was built not out of vanity, but out of desperation and love. Philanthropist Nikolai Smetsky constructed the monumental building in 1913 for his wife Olga, who suffered from tuberculosis. Legend has it that it possessed 365 rooms so she could sleep in a fresh, germ-free space every night. The "Red Building" was a medical marvel of its time. Olga's life was saved, but the building itself is doomed. Since the war in the 1990s, the palace has been a roofless ruin, with the wind of the Caucasus now blowing through its empty window sockets.
