How a hundred-year-old house in the center of Kyiv became a kitchen for the Klitschko Hotel

At one of the next sessions of the Kyiv City Council, the mayor of the capital, Vitaliy Klitschko, may allow his brother, Vladimir, to take the land under the century-old house, which is used to house the kitchen of their 11 Mirrors hotel.

In July 2023, a draft decision on registration of land allocation for 0.11 hectares at 34-B Bogdan Khmelnitsky Street was registered on the Kyiv City Council website. On this site there is a building owned by Klitschko Jr.’s company “VIT-PLUS”.

They want to lease the land for the construction and maintenance of administrative or office buildings. Currently, this draft decision of the City Council is being approved by the relevant commissions.

Prior to this, in June 2017, VIT-PLUS Klitschko Jr. received a 20-year lease for the site under the 11 Mirrors hotel on the street. Bogdan Khmelnitsky, 34-a. Vitali Klitschko, who usually disappears somewhere after the start of the session, did not vote for this decision.

How the Klitschkos built a hotel next to their apartment

As the website “Investigation.Info” wrote, in the early 2000s, the Klitschko brothers received for use almost 3 acres of land on Bogdan Khmelnitsky Street in Kyiv. This happened after they bought an apartment on the same street, directly opposite the German Embassy.

A hotel was built next to the apartment for the football championship.

The site that the Klitschkos bought was then free from development and, in preparation for the final part of the 2012 European Football Championship, the boxers decided to build a hotel there. These plans are reflected in the resolution of the Cabinet of Ministers under Azarov.

Next to the “11 Mirrors” hotel, which was built quite quickly, on Bohdan Khmelnitsky Street, 34-B, there was the “Author’s House”. This was the popular name for the premises of the Ukrainian Agency for Copyright and Related Rights.

The hotel completely blocked the "Author's House". It is known that this structure was built in 1895, but it did not receive monument status. Along with the start of construction of the hotel, attempts began to evict the government agency from there. And at the beginning of 2012, the agency finally moved to a new address.

How the “Author’s House” became the property of the Klitschko company

In 2005, the private company Capital won an investment competition and, by agreement with the City Council, was to build a 10-story office center with underground parking on the site of the Author’s House.

However, the plans of the capital's authorities changed over time. At the end of 2013, the City Council entered into an agreement to rent the “Author’s House” with the company “Alternativa,” which was also related to the Klitschko brothers’ entourage. One of the directors of this company was Sergei Boyarchukov, close to the family of the mayor of the capital, who became widely known after the demolition of the 200-year-old building on Yaroslavskaya, 13B.

“Alternative” received the building on the condition that a library or museum would appear there. However, the fulfillment of these conditions, especially when Vitali Klitschko became mayor of Kyiv, was not closely checked. This was done by the Prosecutor General's Office. They found that instead of a library or museum, the building was turned into the kitchen of the 11 Mirrors Hotel.

Two companies, Capital and Alternative, began a legal battle. The company, which is associated with the Klitschko family, stated that the investment agreement with Capital should be terminated because it prevents it from using the building. The court decisions were like a game of ping pong and, as expected, the legitimate investor lost. This happened in April 2018.

Companies associated with the Klitschko family competed with each other.

The following year, the “Author’s House” was sold at auction for UAH 44.5 million to the Vit-Plus company, which is asking the Kyiv City Council for a land allotment. You'll never guess who this company's rival was! The already well-known company “Alternative”. Judging by the auction, it was not a price competition, but a “giveaway game.”

UAH 44.5 million is a low price for construction in the center of Kyiv. Klitschko’s subordinates from the Kyivzhilspetsexploitation enterprise calculated its initial cost - almost 164 million UAH.

“The auction was held between the arrests of the building - then investigators from the State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) became interested in the fate of the century-old house. The court placed him under arrest, blocking privatization. The mayor's office and the Alternative company persistently sought to cancel this arrest. In the end, they succeeded - the Pechersky District Court of the capital canceled the arrest,” says the Investigative.Info material. It is curious that the statement of crime was filed by the director of the company “Capital”, which won the investment competition.

It turned out that the SBI was unable to bring the matter with the “House of Authors” to completion. In January 2021, Pechersky District Court judge Sergei Vovk refused to extend the time frame for the pre-trial investigation for investigators. Therefore, the bureau closed the proceedings.

The story of how the mansion became the property of the family of the mayor of Kyiv was told by journalists from one of the leading TV channels in Ukraine. The court, to which Vitali and Vladimir Klitschko turned, found this story to be untrue.

They tried to appeal the decision, but it is not known from the court register how this dispute ended.