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17, Nevsky Prospekt
Subway: +7 (812) 571-8238
Tel. +7 (812) 571-8238
Open: daily 10am- 6pm (10am- 5pm on Monday)
Closed: Tuesday
Stroganov Palace is one of the best examples of Russian Baroque architecture, designed by the famous architect Rastrelli. Facade of this large white and pink building is covered by beautiful moldings and statues. Stroganov Palace has over 50 rooms, a central hall and a gallery with high mirrors and sculptures. The entrance to its magnificent residence is decorated with coats of arms of Stroganov (Stroganoff) family. New owners of Stroganov Palace were so famous, they paid a large sum as well as a portrait painted by artist Rotary.
The interior of Stroganov Palace hasn't change through time, yet the exterior have changed several times. At various times it was painted pink, brick- red, green. In the end of the 20th century Stroganov Palace was turned into a part of a Russian Museum. Today it holds a gallery of wax figures of the people who often visited the estate. Additionally exhibits from the Russian Museum are commonly held in Stroganov Palace.
In addition to F. B. Rastrelli, M. G. Zemtsov
(presumably), F. I. Demertsov, A. N. Voronikhin, I. F. Kolodin, K.
Rossi, I. Charlemagne, P. S. Sadovnikov participated in the creation of
the palace .
Rastrelli's masterpiece
The architect Rastrelli,
overseeing the construction of the Winter Palace for Empress Elizabeth
Petrovna, lived in a house purchased by Baron S. G. Stroganov in 1742 at
the corner of the river embankment. Moika and Nevsky Prospekt. The first
considerations about the time of construction of a new house by the
architect Rastrelli were expressed by N. M. Kolmakov, who took the date
1752 as the beginning of construction, and 1754 as the end. In
subsequent years, this issue remained outside the field of special
attention of research, until in 1991 Yu. V. Trubinov suggested a
six-week rapid construction. In the future, this turned out to be a
mistake, and at present, the period of construction of the Stroganov
Palace is considered to be 1753-1754. In addition, it should be borne in
mind that Rastrelli did not work from scratch, but widely used those
structures that he inherited from an earlier period in the history of
the building. Yu. M. Denisov called M. G. Zemtsov the author of the
former, two-story house. There are also reasons to think that the
one-story house of the Stroganovs, which stood a little to the south on
the embankment of the Moika River, also fell into the construction of
the Rastrelli house. However, the problem has not been finally resolved.
The palace built by Rastrelli consists of two buildings with a
courtyard, the facades, as the architect himself wrote, "are decorated
with the most beautiful architecture in the Italian style." The facades
were first painted with "sand paint with yellow", as well as the walls
of the Winter Palace located opposite, across the wasteland (there was
no Palace Square yet), then they were repainted in pink and white.
Individual details (balcony grilles) are gilded. The four statues
depicting the "Four Parts of the World" and the sculptures of the
pediment of the main façade have not been preserved. There is an
assumption that the profile of A. S. Stroganov is depicted in the relief
medallions of the facade.
The composition of both facades of the
palace follows the classic three-part scheme, however, the main facade
along Nevsky Prospekt with a passage arch to the courtyard looks more
baroque due to powerful braces, three oval windows, grouping of columns
and a torn arched pediment, in the tympanum of which the coat of arms of
the Stroganov family is placed.
The front staircase, the Great
Hall, the gallery of mirrors - in all, fifty front rooms were
magnificently decorated in the "Rastrelli style". The stucco rocaille
decor, mascarons of window trims and murals were made by Italian
craftsmen. The researchers note that in this building, as in others,
Rastrelli used his favorite composite method, connecting dissimilar
elements in new, unusual combinations. Classic Parisian hotels (city
mansions) are cited as examples: Hotel Lambert (1642-1644; architect
Louis Leveaux), Hotel Lauzin (1657; L. Levoe), Hotel Lebrun (1700;
Germain Beaufran), Hotel Crozat (1724; Pierre Bullet ). However,
Rastrelli himself emphasized that he works "in the Italian manner."
Therefore, "it can be concluded that the architect combined the features
of a classic Italian palazzo and a French hotel in the type of urban
noble mansion."
The historian of St. Petersburg architecture V.
Ya. Kurbatov, referring only to the facades of the Stroganov Palace, in
1913 mentioned the Trautzon Palace in Vienna, built by I. B. Fischer von
Erlach the Elder in 1710-1712, as a possible prototype.
It is
also significant that in the first design version, the courtyard of the
Stroganov Palace had a semicircular shape, which can be seen as an
indirect influence of the Italian baroque brought into the Rastrelli
style through the German-Austrian school of Fischer von Erlach (a
similar semicircular courtyard is found in the Trautzon Palace and in
the Hotel Beauvais in Paris by Antoine Lepôtre.
Of the interiors
of Rastrelli in the Stroganov House, the following have been preserved:
the Great Hall (partially modified by Voronikhin) and the Main Entrance
Hall.
House of Voronikhin
Since 1756, the palace was
owned by the son of the baron Alexander Sergeevich Stroganov. In 1787 he
undertook significant restructuring. At the beginning of the 19th
century, in the western part of the house (probably by A. N.
Voronikhin), the Small and Large Living Rooms were re-finished. The
Cabinet (museum) of Count A. S. Stroganov is well preserved. Of the
existing halls: the so-called Hubert Robert Hall, the Mineral Study, the
Art Gallery - the most famous part, the Library and the Physical Study.
Traditionally, A. N. Voronikhin was considered the author of most of the
interiors, until in the late 1980s N. V. Glinka defended her
dissertation on the work of F. I. Demertsov. In it, as well as in a
number of related articles and a 2002 book, it was suggested that F.I.
Demertsov was the author of the Picture and Physics Cabinet, as well as
two Canteens (behind the Picture Cabinet and in the northwestern corner
of the building). N. V. Glinka considered the last hall to be a joint
work of Voronikhin and Demertsov. This point of view was shared by V. K.
Shuisky and Yu. V. Trubinov, but disputed by S. O. Kuznetsov.
A.
N. Voronikhin created a magnificent vestibule, a staircase with powerful
"Paestum" Doric columns, a Mineral Cabinet (recreated in 2003) with a
dome and an upper bypass gallery. In the Mineral Cabinet, the count
placed his mineralogical collection and a library on geology and mining.
The large dance hall, decorated by Rastrelli, with a plafond by the
Italian painter Giuseppe Valeriani (1753), was delicately changed by
Voronikhin, creating a unique fusion of Rastrelli's baroque-rocaille
style and Alexander's classicism. "Architects consistently implemented a
single and constantly updated program, the authors of which were
customers - Alexander and Pavel Stroganov."
physical cabinet
A. N. Voronikhin was engaged in altering the interiors of the Stroganov
Palace after returning from a trip abroad together with the son of Count
Pavel Alexandrovich in 1786-1790. In place of the Bufetnaya, Voronikhin
created the Physical Cabinet (alchemical laboratory) in the "Egyptian
style". The office served as a "Masonic temple" for the owner. Count
Stroganov was a well-known Freemason, a member of the famous Les Neuf
Sœurs lodge, and held high positions in Masonic lodges in Prussia and
France. Participated in the creation of the Masonic organization, called
the Grand Orient of France. In the famous portrait of A. S. Stroganov by
A. G. Varnek (1814) from the collection of the State Russian Museum, the
count is depicted in his Egyptian study by the window overlooking the
Kazan Cathedral (the artist’s fantasy does not correspond to the actual
layout of the palace). Behind is a bust of Zeus Otricolius with a Latin
inscription: “Art Aegiptiaca Petropoli Renata” (Egyptian Art, renewed in
Petropolis). In fact, according to one version, the inscription was
located above the entrance to the Egyptian Cabinet.
During the
period of historicism
The prevailing idea of the Stroganov Palace
as a building created exclusively by Rastrelli and Voronikhin is wrong.
The first section noted the participation of M. G. Zemtsov in the
addition of his final appearance. In addition, in 1818, some of the
interiors of the building in the southern and western buildings were
rebuilt by the architect I.F. Kolodin. In 1820, K. Rossi created a
project for the apartments of Prince V. S. Golitsyn and his wife A. P.
Golitsyna, nee Countess Stroganova. An insignificant fragment has been
preserved, most of which is currently occupied by the so-called Hall
with an oak fireplace, probably associated with the period of Count S.
A. Stroganov. In 1842, P. S. Sadovnikov completed the formation of the
southern body of the building. It started with the one-story Rastrelli
Gallery, which connected the chambers of Baron S. G. Stroganov with the
kitchen. At the beginning of the 19th century, Voronikhin made a
two-story extension to the western building, which housed the office of
Countess S. V. Stroganova. Between 1811 and 1814, he enlarged the
building by one more axis, and since then there have been two offices -
the Large and the Small. In 1842, P. S. Sadovnikov gave the southern
building its current appearance. An example of the interior creativity
of this architect is only the so-called Front Bedroom in the southern
building (restored, but not available for viewing). The authorship of
many works has not been established. In the northern part of the
building there are the Large and Small offices of Count S. G. Stroganov
and the so-called Arabesque Gallery adjoining the first of them. All of
them were created in the middle of the 19th century, as well as the now
known decoration of the Large Living Room in the western building.
Garden of the Stroganov House
The Stroganov Palace
forms a square in the plan, in the center of which there is a patio
(inner courtyard). It is possible that already in 1793 there was a
garden on the territory of the patio, which was laid out by A. N.
Voronikhin. There is no garden on the plans of the Stroganov House in
the first half of the 19th century. In 1908, it was re-planned to
accommodate the sculptures and the "Tomb of Homer", previously located
at the Stroganov Dacha. It was available for visiting and left a
nostalgic mark on the times of youth in the souls of many citizens. It
existed until 2003, when it was cut down, and a summer restaurant under
sheds was opened in its place.