Laguna Vere is a vast Soviet-era aquatic palace in central Tbilisi, Georgia, once the Caucasus’ first world-class open-air swimming complex and now a silent brutalist ruin half-buried in mud and memories. Built in the 1960s–70s with Olympic pools, grandstands for 5,500 spectators, gyms and saunas, it welcomed everyday Tbilisians alongside elite athletes until neglect, privatization and a devastating 2015 flood finally shut its gates for good.

The 2015 flood that damaged Laguna Vere was caused by intense, prolonged rainfall over the Vere River basin that triggered large landslides and debris flows, turning the normally small river into a sudden, destructive flash flood. Heavy rain had already saturated the ground for weeks, so when a major landslide near Akhaldaba and other slope failures dumped mud, rocks, trees and debris into the river, this material blocked tunnels and narrowed sections of the channel, forcing the floodwaters, mud and debris to spill out into the city and along the right bank of the Mtkvari where the Laguna Vere ramps and nearby infrastructure were heavily damaged.

This photo gallery wanders through peeling corridors, empty green training halls and the iconic diving tower, tracing how a proud monument to collective leisure has faded into an eerie time capsule of Soviet modernism, suspended between decay and the hope of future revival.