Moscow: Scene

Spots for eating, drinking, shopping and thinking in the Russian capital.

TURANDOT: Ever wonder what the inside of a Fabergé egg might look like? Add lots of gold, French-accented chinoiserie stylings, waiters in powdered wigs and 18th-century outfits, and you have Turandot, the most over-the-top restaurant in a city of over-the-top restaurants. The 400-seat venue now hosts the city's power brokers and dazzled tourists.

WINZAVOD: This is where Moscow's cool young crowd goes for intellectual stimulation. The converted wine factory contains nine galleries, and recently hosted a show of a well-known socialite's shoe collection, as well as photos by Terry Richardson. If visitors tire of art, they can slip into Cara & Co., the only store in the complex, which sells Belgian and Australian fashion and recently opened an intimate cafe.

SHYOLK RESTAURANT TEAROOM: If you didn't know where this spot was, you'd probably never find it. Tucked in a courtyard off a square by Belorussky Station, behind a virtually unmarked metal door and down some stairs, is the Chinese tearoom run by Shyolk restaurant (which has its more visible location upstairs). With fewer than 10 tables, the setting is dark, quiet and atmospheric, a favorite of celebs.

If you get by the face-control — the Russian phrase for nightclub bouncers — then Rai's faux-diamond walls are a sight to behold. Expensive, ostentatious and tacky, it's as if the Moscow of the Nineties never went away.