The Ural capital has launched a large-scale cultural and educational campaign, Ekaterinburg Speaking. The project is timed to coincide with the International Festival of Youth – 2026 and is being carried out with support from the Presidential Fund for Cultural Initiatives.

As part of the media campaign, 12 short videos will be shown on 43 media facades and outdoor digital screens in Ekaterinburg and Moscow. Each video explores one theme of the Russian cultural code: home and family, folk song, memory of the Victory, hospitality and the shared dinner, and traditional crafts.

In the first video, launched in Ekaterinburg, international participants of the upcoming Festival showcase items of Russian everyday life – from matryoshka dolls and Gzhel porcelain painting to Pavlovsky Posad shawls – sharing their discoveries about Russia. Through the foreigners' sense of wonder and genuine curiosity, Russians are invited to take a fresh look at their own culture – at things that have long become familiar and ordinary to them.

Over three weeks, the Ekaterinburg Speaking videos will be seen by around 3 million people on the media facades of the project's partner, the MAER media holding.

From September 11 to 17, 10,000 participants and 2,000 volunteers from 191 countries and 89 regions of Russia will gather in the Ural capital. The International Festival of Youth – 2026 will be held under the motto "Follow Your Dream," with a program designed to introduce guests to the achievements of modern Russia in science, digitalization, creative industries, media, and entrepreneurship.

All of the Ekaterinburg Speaking project's materials – 12 episodes of documentary video interviews and accompanying articles – will be published in outlets across 22 regions of Russia.