artists involved in decorating the Library, Shchuko is personally credited for the design of the sculptural frieze facing Mokhovaya and Vozdvizhenka streets. Modern authors consider the Library, along with the Mayakovskaya station, to be Moscow's nearest approximations of Art Deco style and compare it to the 1937 Palais de Chaillot in Paris. In 1930 Shchuko and Gelfreikh launched construction of a large (2,500 and 850 seats) opera theatre in Rostov-on-Don. The open contest to design the Rostov theatre was won by the Barkhin family partnership, but after the results were announced, Shchuko personally arrived in Rostov and persuaded the commissioners to discard the Barkhin drafts. The constructivist theater was completed in 1935, when Shchuko was working on the Palace of Soviets. An elaborate set of rotating stages provided unprecedented freedom to producers and designers, even allowing live cavalry marches on stage. Despite its award-winning exterior and plans, the theatre was never used for its intended purpose: poor acoustics rendered it useless for music, and it has not produced a single opera show. It was destroyed in World War II and rebuilt in 1963; this time, the main hall was reduced to 1,200 seats but acquired proper acoustics. Palace of Soviets Schuko and Gelfreikh participated in the early, public stages of the contest for the Palace of Soviets (1931–1932); their best-known draft was an oversized near copy of the Doge's Palace in Venice. The last, closed, stage of the contest was won by Boris Iofan. On May 10, 1933, Iofan was announced as the winner and officially instructed to redesign his proposal so as to crown it with a gigantic, "50 to 75 meter" statue of Lenin. Four weeks later (June 4), Iofan was "supplied" with two "assistants" - Shchuko and Gelfreikh, both his seniors, and having a longer track of successful construction management practice dating from the 1900s. According to mainstream history accounts, Shchuko and Gelfreikh were appointed because the immense project had to be completed quickly, and the establishment feared that Iofan was not experienced enough to handle it alone. Modern historians like Dmitry Khmelnitsky assert that the concept was Stalin's own vision imposed through Shchuko and Gelfreikh and perfected through their expertise. All authors agree on the fact that the trio initially disagreed over the placement of Lenin's statue: Shchuko insisted on literally placing the statue on top of the main hall, as instructed by the decree, while