The Black Tulip War Memorial is one of Ekaterinburg's most sombre public monuments. Its name refers to the aircraft that carried Soviet dead home from Afghanistan, and the central seated figure is surrounded by metal forms that feel more like a trap than a triumph.
This is not a decorative stop; it is a place to pause and read the city through twentieth-century loss. It sits close enough to the centre to fold into a walk between museums and churches, and it gives a harder edge to a city often presented through industry and imperial history.