Mikhail Ilchenko works as a research fellow at the Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO) in Leipzig. He holds a PhD in Political Sciences and his studies focus on various aspects of urban transformations in Eastern Europe with a particular emphasis on changing public perceptions of the modernist architectural heritage. Since 2014 he had research stays as a postdoc and guest scholar at the Center for Urban History of East Central Europe in Lviv (Ukraine), Leibniz Institute for Regional Geography (IFL) and GWZO-Institute in Leipzig (Germany). He conducted his research on modernist urban legacy in different countries, including Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Czech Republic, Israel, France, Germany. His articles on post-socialist transformations and modernist urban heritage are published in various journals and edited volumes in English, Russian, Ukrainian and Polish languages. His recent book, which he prepared as co-editor with Valentin Mihaylov is called “Post-Utopian Spaces: Transforming and Re-Evaluating Urban Icons of Socialist Modernism” (published by Routledge 2023).