Sretenka, a street that plays a significant role in the historical development of Moscow, but has not had a particularly happy fate. It is part of one of the oldest roads in Moscow and all of Northeastern Rus, known as the "roads of Yuri Dolgoruky." This road led north to Rostov the Great, and in Moscow (in the area of Lubyanka Square) it transitioned to a path southwest to Chernigov and Kiev. The street got its name in honor of the meeting of the Miraculous Image of the Holy Virgin, transferred from Vladimir to Moscow in 1395 during Timur's (Tamerlane's) campaign against Northeastern Rus. Thanks to this image, Rus avoided devastation.

Over time, firewood and bast trading emerged in the square at the beginning of Sretenka, which is why the square and the beginning of Sretenka (up to the Boulevard Ring) became known as Lubyanka, while the name Sretenka was preserved for the section from the Boulevard Ring to the Garden Ring. Architecturally, Sretenka is inferior to Mira Avenue and neighboring streets such as Myasnitskaya and Rozhdestvenka. One of the few architectural monuments on Sretenka is the estate of the merchants Kiryaynovs, built probably in the 1780s after the Plague Riot of 1771. This is confirmed by the placement of the main house of the estate in the strict classicism style along the red line of the street.

In the second half of the 19th century, the estate began to be used for renting out housing. Here lived the famous Moscow sculptor Sergey Mikhailovich Volnukhin. His fate was not easy; he is known as the author of the monument to the first printer Ivan Fedorov at the Kitai-Gorod wall. Volnukhin came from a merchant family from Zamoskvorechye. Despite family traditions, he was sent to study at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture. Volnukhin studied there for a long time and in the mid-1880s, almost simultaneously with his graduation from the school, he got married. Due to his father's deteriorating financial situation, he was forced to "live on his own." The small number of significant works by Volnukhin can be explained by the fact that he worked in various fields of art, including as a model maker in the Ovchinnikov firm, and constantly taught.

Among his legacy, the bust of P.M. Tretyakov stands out, created after the patron's death in 1898. Volnukhin rented an apartment on Sretenka until 1898, when he was elected head of the sculpture workshop at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture, after which he moved to a state apartment in the school complex on Myasnitskaya. The building is currently undergoing repairs and adaptations for modern use.