In the 1950s and 60s, the invasion of foreign culture--as cause, effect, and one facet of de-Stalinization--restructured Soviet society and reshaped the relationship between the government and its subjects. My dissertation examines how the Soviet government and the educated Russian-speaking public imagined the "West," tasted its fruit, and were profoundly transformed in the process. I focus on imported music, film, literature, exhibits, and material artifacts, with the Sixth International Youth Festival (1957) serving as the structural center of my study. I will pursue these subjects along two distinct lines of inquiry: the characteristics of the reformism of the 1950s-60s and the process whereby foreign culture became an integral part of the native landscape.