The Russian Chapel (officially the Church of St. Mary Magdalene) stands on the Mathildenhöhe immediately adjacent to the Wedding Tower, its five golden onion domes entirely incongruous against the Jugendstil buildings around it. It was commissioned by Tsar Nicholas II in 1899 and built by the St. Petersburg architect Leonty Benois, decorated with mosaics and gilded woodwork in the Russian Orthodox tradition.
The chapel is still consecrated and services are occasionally held here. Visitors can usually enter during opening hours to see the richly decorated interior — the iconostasis, the painted walls, and the mosaic floors that feel completely at odds with everything else on the hilltop. For sheer unexpectedness, this is one of the more surprising sights in Hessen.
The chapel is a five-minute walk from the Wedding Tower on the Mathildenhöhe. Combined with the colony buildings and the tower, it makes for a full morning's sightseeing on the hill.