Matryoshka Square is the most photographed sight in Manzhouli — a 3,200-square-metre plaza filled with over 200 oversized Russian nesting dolls painted in vivid colours, each one unique. The square functions as both a park and a visual declaration of the city's Russian identity, and it works: walking through rows of enormous painted dolls, with the steppe visible in the distance, is a genuinely surreal experience.
The square is at its most atmospheric in the evening when the dolls are lit from below. Many of the Russian matryoshki were gifted by Russian cities as goodwill gestures, and information boards (in Chinese and Russian, rarely English) explain the cultural exchange. The square doubles as a shopping and restaurant district, with the surrounding buildings styled in mock-Russian architecture.