If we go along Staraya Ulitsa (literally Old Street), which leads from the central square to the Convent of the Deposition of the Robe, we would see on the left-hand side the Church of Saint Lazarus.
There was a wooden Church of the same name on this spot by the north gates of the stockade (new settling) in the fifteenth century, which possessed a tent-shaped spire at the beginning of the seventeenth century. The present five-domed Church, built in 1667, has an exterior typical of many seventeenth-century Churches. It has a cube-shaped main body with three apses, differently designed portals on each wall, a rich cornice of horseshoe-shaped kokoshniks, and a tiling band. The same kokoshnik motif decorates the bases of the corner dome drums and the drums themselves are adorned with a decorative arcade band. Unlike most Churches of this type, however, where the corner dome drums do not have windows, all five drums possess them. This is explained by the Church's unusual two-pillar construction. Inside it has two pillars supporting two pairs of longitudinal arches established to the east and west walls. The arches are vaulted and the drum of the dome stands in the central vaults between the pillars. This kind of construction was known as early as the sixteenth century and first appeared in the northern towns beyond the Volga from whence it spread to the Volga area. The existence of such a building in Suzdal suggests that it may have been the work of builders from the north, possibly from Vologda. The Cathedral in the Monastery of Saint Vasiliy, built slightly earlier, can possibly also be ascribed to them.
The main Church forms a pair with the heated Church of Saint Antipius, built a century later in 1745, which has a fine decorative crest of open metalwork running along the ridge of the roof.
At its west end it is adjoined by a very attractive, slender bell-tower which appears to have been erected somewhat earlier and has a concave tent-shaped spire typical of Suzdalian architecture and round dormer windows. It is very similar to the bell-tower of the Church of Saint Nicholas in the Kremlin.
When this group of buildings was restored by Alexey Varganov in 1959 the bell-tower was repainted in its original bright colours making it stand out from the other Suzdal bell-towers. The fashion for ordering buildings to be decorated in bright colours was typical of an earlier period, the seventeenth century.