Catherine's Winter Palace 2. Imperial mansions: history of the Winter Palace

We all walk around the Winter Palace, looking at paintings, lampshades, vases, tapestries, parquet flooring, gilding in general, all sorts of works of art, but there wasn’t always a museum here, people lived here, and not just any, but the rulers of a great state, so I want see in what chambers their lives passed. Therefore, let's visit the living quarters Winter Palace. Currently, only part of the magnificent series of residential apartments that once occupied a significant place in the huge building has been preserved in the Winter Palace.

On April 16, 1841, the marriage of the heir to Tsarevich Alexander Nikolaevich, the future Emperor Alexander II, and the Princess General of State, who received the title of Grand Duchess Tsarevna, took place. Maria Alexandrovna, the future empress, settled in the rooms assigned to her on the second floor of the northwestern part of the palace. She lived in these chambers until her death in 1880. Maria Alexandrovna's apartment consisted of eight rooms, some of which have retained their decoration to this day.

Large office of Grand Duchess Maria Nikolaevna, watercolor by E. P. Gau

The boudoir, or Small Study, was one of Maria Alexandrovna’s favorite places. Its decoration was made in the mid-nineteenth century by the architect Harold Bosse in the style of the second Rococo, fashionable at that time.

Boudoir of Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna, watercolor by E.P. Gau
Bedroom of Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna, watercolor by E.P. Gau

It’s as if the atmosphere of a fairy tale has been created here, the patterns twist whimsically, the shine of gilding sets off the slender figures of the snow-white caryatids. A magnificent bronze chandelier is reflected in mirrors of various shapes. In her cozy boudoir, Maria Alexandrovna spent a lot of free time, reading, writing letters to her family, and drinking tea with her husband. From here there was an exit to the stairs, along which one could go down to the first floor, to the children's rooms.

Raspberry cabinet

Crimson study of Empress Maria Alexandrovna, watercolor by E.P. Gau

Receptions of the empress's personal guests and meetings with relatives of the royal family took place in the Big or Raspberry Office. The office was also a kind of music salon. In the fabric designs covering the walls, you can see numerous images of musical instruments and notes. The frame of the huge fireplace mirror is crowned with cupids holding a shield in their hands, on which is depicted the monogram of Maria Alexandrovna.

Crimson Cabinet of the Winter Palace, © State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg

Golden living room

With its shining abundance of gilding, the Golden Living Room is reminiscent of the chambers of the Moscow Kremlin with their vaulted ceilings and richly decorated walls. True, the owner of the apartment herself compared her living room with the throne room of the Bavarian kings.

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Winter Palace on Palace Square - the former royal residence, a symbol of the Elizabethan Baroque architectural style, the most Grand Palace In Petersburg. From the first Soviet years The most famous museum in Russia, the State Hermitage, operates here.

The first Winter Palaces. Winter Palace of Anna Ioannovna

Palace of F. M. Apraksin

On the site of the world-famous St. Petersburg Winter Palace, the first building appeared under Peter I. In 1705, in the northwestern corner of the site occupied by the current palace, a wooden house of Admiral Fyodor Matveevich Apraksin was built. It was designed by an architect Domenico Trezzini. The place was chosen by the admiral, among other things, because of the rules of the “fortification esplanade”. They required that the nearest building be located at a distance of at least 200 fathoms (1 fathom = approximately 2.1 meters) from the fortress, that is, from the Admiralty.

In 1707, next to Apraksin’s house, from the south, the house of A.V. Kikin appeared. To the east of the admiral's possession were the plots of S.V. Raguzinsky, P.I. Yaguzhinsky and G.P. Chernyshev. Apraksin's house, as the first one built on Palace Embankment, set its red line. Kikin's house marked the northern border of Admiralty Meadow (future Palace Square).

It is worth noting that Peter I and Catherine I did not live here. Peter's first Winter Palace was built on the site of house No. 32 Palace Embankment, where it is now Hermitage Theater. This building was rebuilt several times; the founder of St. Petersburg died in it.

In 1712, Apraksin's house was rebuilt in stone. Soon he ceased to suit the admiral, who wanted to live in more luxurious surroundings. In 1716, the house was rebuilt for the third time for Apraksin, and after the arrival of the famous architect Leblond in St. Petersburg - for the fourth time. Due to his constant workload, Leblond was unable to complete this project. The construction plan was reworked by the architect Fyodor Vasiliev. At the same time, he added a third floor to the building and slightly redesigned its facade.

First Winter Palace of Peter I

In 1718, after the execution of Kikin, the Naval Academy was located in his house.

In 1725, the newlyweds Duke of Holstein and the daughter of Peter I Anna temporarily lived in the Apraksin Palace. They were the first to occupy the “half” for high-ranking persons in these chambers. Kammer-junker Berchholtz, who was here, noted that he:

“The largest and most beautiful in all of St. Petersburg, moreover, it stands on the Bolshaya Neva and has a very pleasant location. The entire house is furnished magnificently and in the latest fashion, so that the king could live decently in it...”

In 1728, the admiral died. He bequeathed his property to his relatives. Apraksin was related to the Romanovs, he was the brother of Tsarina Marfa Matveevna, the second wife of his elder brother Peter I. Therefore, something should have gone to the young Emperor Peter II. The admiral bequeathed his St. Petersburg palace to him. However, Peter II never lived here, as he moved to Moscow.

With the accession of Empress Anna Ioannovna to the throne, St. Petersburg was returned to the capital status selected by Peter II. The new ruler needed to establish her residence here. Anna Ioannovna considered the Winter Palace of Peter I too modest for herself and in 1731 decided to settle in the Apraksin Palace. She entrusted its reconstruction to Domenico Trezzini. But the empress was not impressed by his work; she wanted to live in splendor and luxury. In the end, I got the job.

He designed the Winter Palace of Anna Ioannovna together with his father Bartolomeo Carlo Rastrelli. This is indicated by the following message from Jacob Stehlin:

“Rastrelli, Cavaliero del Ordine di Salvador of the Pope, built a large wing to the house of Admiral Apraksin, as well as a large hall, gallery and court theater.
His son had to destroy everything and build a new winter palace on this site for Empress Elizabeth.”

[Cit. on 2, p. 329].

Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli

This means that the main architect of Anna Ioannovna’s Winter House was not Francesco Bartolomeo, but his father Bartolomeo Carlo Rastrelli. The son only helped his father, later taking credit for this work.

On May 3, 1732, a decree was issued to allocate 200,000 rubles for the construction of the palace. On May 27, the groundbreaking ceremony took place.

The house of the Maritime Academy (Kikin's house) was demolished for the new construction. This was necessary in order to arrange the main facade of the royal residence from the side of the Admiralty. From the Neva side, it could not be formalized due to the fact that the Raguzinsky and Yaguzhinsky plots located to the east of Apraksin’s house had not yet been purchased. Their demolition, unlike the demolition of the Naval Academy building, would take more time. The new third Winter Palace was completely ready in 1735, although Anna Ioannovna spent the winter of 1733-1734 here. From then on, this building became the ceremonial imperial residence for 20 years, and from 1738 Rastrelli became the chief architect of the court of Her Imperial Majesty.

Indoors former palace Apraksin Rastrelli designed the imperial chambers. The facade of this house was not touched, it was only brought under a common roof with the new building. The length of the façade on the Admiralty side was 185 meters. The newly built end building houses the Throne Room, the Blue, Winter, Red and Side Chambers, and the Anti-Chamber.

Winter Palace of Anna Ioannovna

In the Winter Palace of Anna Ioannovna on July 2, 1739, the betrothal of Princess Anna Leopoldovna to Prince Anton-Ulrich took place. The young Emperor Ivan Antonovich was also brought here. He stayed here until November 25, 1741, when the daughter of Peter I, Elizabeth, took power into her own hands.

Elizaveta Petrovna wanted even greater luxury than her predecessor, and the next year she began to rebuild the imperial residence in her own way. Then she ordered to decorate for herself the rooms adjacent to the Light Gallery from the south. Next to her bedchamber there were a “crimson cabinet” and an Amber cabinet. Later, during the dismantling of the third Winter Palace, the amber panels will be transported to Tsarskoe Selo and will become part of the famous Amber Room. Since the dimensions of the cabinet were larger than the dimensions of the rooms where the panels were located before ( Royal Palace in Berlin, human quarters in Summer Garden), Rastrelli placed 18 mirrors between them.

In 1745, the wedding of the heir to the throne, Peter Fedorovich, and Princess Sophia Frederica Augusta of Anhalt-Zerbst (the future Catherine II) was celebrated here. The design of this holiday was done by the architect Rastrelli.

For the growing needs of the empress, more and more premises were required. In 1746, because of this, Rastrelli added an additional building on the Admiralty side, the main façade of which faced south. It was two-story, with a wooden upper floor, and the side façade faced the canal near the Admiralty. That is, the Winter House has become even closer to the shipyard. A year later, a chapel, soap house and other chambers were added to this building. The main goal of the new premises, even a year before their appearance, was to place in the Winter House of the Hermitage a secluded corner for intimate meetings (source No. 1). Two enfilades here led to a corner hall, in which there was a lifting table for 15 people. Elizaveta Petrovna implemented this idea before Catherine II. East. No. 2 claims that the new building was necessary for the newlyweds Pyotr Fedorovich and Ekaterina Alekseevna.

Winter Palace of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna

On January 1, 1752, the Empress decided to expand the Winter Palace. For this purpose, the neighboring plots of Raguzinsky and Yaguzhinsky along the Palace Embankment were purchased. Rastrelli was preparing not to demolish the mansions of the associates of Peter I, but to redecorate them in the same style as the entire building. But in February of the following year, a decree from Elizabeth Petrovna followed:

“...With a new house from the river and the courtyard, there will be a lot of demolition and the construction of two outbuildings with stone buildings, so the chief architect de Rastrelli should compose a project and drawings and submit them for the highest H.I.V. approval...”

Thus, Elizaveta Petrovna decided to demolish the houses of Raguzinsky and Yaguzhinsky and build new buildings in their place. And also build the southern and eastern buildings, enclosing the entire building in a square. Two thousand soldiers began construction work. They dismantled houses on the embankment. At the same time, laying the foundations of the southern building - the main facade of the new Winter Palace - began from the side of Admiralty Meadow. The premises in Apraksin’s former house were also rebuilt. They even removed the roof here to raise the ceilings. The Light Gallery and the Antechamber have undergone changes, and the theater and state rooms have been expanded. And in December 1753, Elizaveta Petrovna wished to increase the height of the Winter Palace from 14 to 22 meters...

At the beginning of January, all construction work was stopped. Rastrelli presented the new drawings to the Empress on the 22nd. Rastrelli proposed building the Winter Palace in a new location. But Elizaveta Petrovna refused to move her winter ceremonial residence. As a result, the architect decided to build the entire building anew, using only the old walls in some places. New project was approved by decree of Elizabeth Petrovna. Victor Buzinov in the book “Palace Square. The Architectural Guide" gives the date of its adoption as June 16, 1754. Yuri Ovsyannikov in his book “Great Architects of St. Petersburg” writes that the decree was issued in July:

“In St. Petersburg, our Winter Palace is not only for receiving foreign ministers and for performing festive rites at court on established days according to the greatness of our Imperial dignity, but also for accommodating us with the necessary servants and things, which is why it was intended rebuild our Winter Palace with large space in length, width and height; for which the reconstruction, according to the estimate, will require 990,000 rubles.”

According to the calculations of the Office of Buildings, the fourth Winter Palace should have been erected in three years. The first two were allocated for the construction of walls, and the third for finishing the premises. The Empress planned a housewarming party for the fall of 1756, the Senate expected three years of construction.

After the project was approved, Rastrelli did not make significant changes to it, but made adjustments to the internal relationships of the premises. He located the main halls on the second floor of the corner projections. From the northeast it was designed Main staircase, from the north-west - the Throne Hall, from the south-east - the church, from the south-west - the theater. They were connected by the Neva, western and southern suites of rooms. The architect allocated the first floor for office space, the third for maids of honor and other servants. The apartments of the head of state were arranged in the south-eastern corner of the Winter Palace; it is best illuminated by the sun. The halls of the Neva Enfilade were intended for receiving ambassadors and ceremonies.

Along with the creation of the Winter Palace, Rastrelli intended to redesign the entire Admiralty Meadow and create a single architectural ensemble here. But this was not implemented.

Few builders of the Winter Palace found housing in neighboring settlements. Most built huts for themselves right on Admiralteysky Meadow. Thousands of serfs were involved in the construction of the palace. Seeing workers flooding St. Petersburg, sellers raised food prices. The building office was forced to prepare food for the builders right here on the construction site. The cost of food was deducted from the salary. It often turned out that after such a deduction the worker was even in debt to the employer. According to an eyewitness:

“Soon, due to climate change, lack of healthy food and bad clothing, various diseases appeared... Difficulties were renewed, and sometimes in a worse form due to the fact that in 1756 many masons walked around the world for non-payment of the money they earned and even, as they said then, died of hunger" [Cit. from: 2, p. 343].

Construction of the Winter Palace was delayed. In 1758, the Senate removed blacksmiths from the construction site, since there was no one to shackle the wheels of carts and cannons. At this time, Russia was at war with Prussia. There was a shortage of not only labor, but also finance.

“The situation of workers... in 1759 presented a truly sad picture. The unrest continued throughout the construction and began to subside only when some of the most important work ceased and several thousand people scattered to their own homes” [Cit. on 2, p. 344].

Elizaveta Petrovna did not live to see the completion of construction; Peter III already took over the work. By this time, the decoration of the facades was completed, but many of the interior spaces were not yet ready. But the emperor was in a hurry. He entered the Winter Palace on Holy Saturday (the day before Easter) April 6, 1762. On the day of the move, the court cathedral church was consecrated and a service was held. Presumably, an architect took part in the decoration of the chambers of Peter III and his wife S. I. Chevakinsky .

The apartments of Peter III were closer to Millionnaya Street, his wife settled in rooms closer to the Admiralty. Below him, on the first floor, Peter III settled his favorite Elizaveta Romanovna Vorontsova.

At the solemn ceremony of consecrating the building, the architect Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli was awarded the Holstein Order and received the rank of major general.

The building included about 1,500 rooms. The perimeter of its facades was about two kilometers. The Winter Palace became the tallest building in St. Petersburg. From 1844 to 1905, a decree of Nicholas I was in force in the city, limiting the height of private houses to one fathom below the eaves of the Winter Palace. 2,622,020 rubles 19 kopecks were spent on the construction of the royal residence.

The cornice of the Winter Palace was decorated with 176 statues and vases. They were carved from Pudozh limestone according to Rastrelli's drawings by the German sculptor Baumchen. Later they were whitewashed.

From the side of the Palace Embankment, the Jordan entrance leads into the building, so named after the royal custom of leaving it on the feast of Epiphany to the ice hole cut opposite, in the Neva - “Jordan”. In the 1930s it began to be called Excursion. The Saltykovsky entrance leads into the western facade, the name of which is given by the name of the count, educator of the future Emperor Alexander I, Field Marshal General Ivan Petrovich Saltykov. He had a huge apartment in the Winter Palace, which could be reached through this entrance. The Saltykovsky entrance is also called the entrance of His Imperial Majesty, as it led to the emperor’s chambers. From here the king came out to review the troops.

There are three entrances to the palace from the southern facade. The one closest to the Admiralty - Her Imperial Majesty. From here there was the shortest path to the chambers of the empresses, as well as to the apartments of Paul I. Therefore, for some time it was called Pavlovsky, and before that - Theater, since it led to the home theater built by Catherine II. Closer to Millionnaya Street is the Commandant's Entrance, where the palace commandant's services were located. Rastrelli did not plan to close the passage to the courtyard with a gate. He remained free.

According to Rastrelli's design, the first floor of the Winter Palace was occupied by large vaulted galleries with arches that pierced all parts of the building. On the sides of the galleries there were service rooms where the servants lived and the guards rested. Warehouses and utility rooms were also located here.

In the summer of 1762, Peter III was killed, the construction of the Winter Palace was completed under Catherine II. First of all, the empress removed Rastrelli from work, and Ivan Ivanovich Betskoy became the manager of the construction site. For Catherine II, the interior chambers of the palace were remodeled by an architect J. B. Vallin-Delamott. At the same time, bay windows were created over the entrances of Her Imperial Majesty and Komendatsky, which were not in Rastrelli’s project. Peter III loved to smoke pipes in these bay windows. On the day of the overthrow of her husband from one of them, Catherine II made a speech to the guards gathered in the square.

Almost immediately after ascending the throne, Catherine II ordered to expand the space of the palace through the construction of a new neighboring building - the Small Hermitage. There is no entrance from the street; the Small Hermitage can only be accessed through the Winter Palace. In its halls the Empress housed her richest collection of paintings, sculptures and objects of applied art. Later, the Great Hermitage and Hermitage Theater .

Reception of the Turkish ambassador at the Winter Palace, 1764

In 1763, the Empress moved to the rooms of her late husband, in the southeastern part of the palace. Vorontsova's place was taken by Catherine's favorite Grigory Orlov. On the side of Palace Square, under Catherine II, there was a Primnaya, where her throne stood. In front of the Reception there was a cavalier's room, where guards stood - cavaliers of the guard. Its windows overlook the balcony above the Commandant's entrance. From here one could get to the Diamond Room, where the Empress kept her jewelry. Behind the Brilliant Room, closer to Millionnaya Street, there was a toilet room, then a bedroom and a boudoir. Behind the White Hall there was a dining room. The Bright Office was adjacent to it. The dining room was followed by the State Bedchamber, which a year later became the Diamond Chamber. In addition, the Empress ordered a library, an office, and a restroom to be built for herself. In the restroom, the empress built a toilet seat from the throne of one of her lovers, the Polish king Poniatowski. Under Catherine, the Winter Palace was built winter Garden, Romanov Gallery. At the same time, the formation of St. George's Hall was completed.

The winter garden occupied an area of ​​140 square meters. Exotic bushes and trees grew in it, flower beds and lawns were arranged here. The garden was decorated with sculpture. There was a fountain in the center. According to P. P. Svinin’s description, during the time of Catherine II, the Winter Garden looked like this:

“The winter garden occupies a significant quadrangular space and contains flowering bushes of laurel and orange trees, always fragrant and green even in severe frosts. Canaries, robins, and siskins flutter from branch to branch and glorify their freedom with sweet, loud singing or casually splash in the jasper pool, which under Empress Catherine was filled with Portuguese goldfish...” [Cit. from: 3, p. 24, 25]

At the request of Catherine II, the central entrance to the courtyard was blocked by pine gates in 1771. They were made in just 10 days according to the design of the architect Felten.

Since Catherine's time, cats have lived in the Winter Palace. The first of them were brought from Kazan. They protect the palace property from rats.

From the first years of her life in the Winter Palace, Catherine II created a specific schedule of events held here. Balls were held on Sundays, on Monday a French comedy was given, Tuesday was a day of rest, on Wednesday they played a Russian comedy, on Thursday a tragedy or French opera, followed by a traveling masquerade. On Friday, masquerades were given at court, on Saturday they rested.

On September 29, 1773, the wedding of the future Emperor Paul I with Wilhelmina of Hesse-Darmstadt (in Orthodoxy - Natalya Alekseevna) took place in the Winter Palace. After the wedding, the highest nobility gathered in the throne room, where the table was set. This was followed by a ball, which was opened by the newlyweds. However, Natalia's dress turned out to be so heavy due to the precious stones scattered across the sky that she was able to dance only a few minuets. While Natalya was being undressed, Pavel was having dinner in the next room with his mother.

In 1776, Grand Duchess Natalya Alekseevna died in the chambers of the Winter Palace during childbirth. The unborn child died with her.

In 1780, Catherine II decided that it was inappropriate for the public to enter the Hermitage through her own chambers. By her decree, a connecting gallery was created between the Winter Palace and the Small Hermitage, with the help of which visitors could bypass the royal apartments. Thus the Marble Gallery and the new Throne Hall appeared. It was opened on November 26 (St. George's Day) 1795 and named "St. George's". The Apollo Hall was located behind it.

Until 1790, from the Main (later Ambassadorial, Jordan) staircase there was an entrance to a suite of five halls of approximately the same size. They led to the sixth - the Throne Room, located in the northwestern corner of the palace. In the 1790s, three front halls were combined into the Great (later Nikolaevsky) Hall. In front of them was the Antechamber, and behind it was the Concert Hall.

In 1796, Catherine II died in the Winter Palace. The coffin with her body was displayed in the bedroom for farewell (the third and fourth windows on the right, from the Palace Square).

Winter Palace, 1810s

Under Paul I, a memorial office for his father Peter III was created in the Diamond Room. Immediately after ascending the throne, he ordered the construction of a wooden bell tower for the palace Cathedral of the Holy Image of the Savior, whose dome is clearly visible from Palace Square. The bell tower was built on the roof of the palace, west of the cathedral. In addition, a bell tower was also built for a small church. The rooms of the emperor’s children were then located on the site of the White Hall.

After the death of Paul I, the suite of rooms on the third floor on the side of Palace Square belonged to his widow, Empress Maria Feodorovna.

In 1817, Alexander I invited the architect Karl Rossi to work in the Winter Palace. He was entrusted with remodeling the rooms where the daughter of the Prussian king, Princess Caroline, the bride of Grand Duke Nikolai Pavlovich (the future Nicholas I), would stay. In five months, Rossi remodeled ten rooms located along Palace Square: the Shpalernaya, the Large Dining Room, the Living Room...

In 1825, the courtyard of the Winter Palace was paved with cobblestones.

Even Alexander I planned to create the Gallery of 1812 in the Winter Palace. He learned about the creation of a “Hall of Waterloo Memory” at Windsor Castle with portraits of Napoleon’s victors. But the British won one battle, and the Russians won the whole war and entered Paris. To create a gallery, the English artist George Dow was invited to St. Petersburg, and was given a special room in the palace for his work. Young artists Alexander Polyakov and Vasily Golike were given to help him.

Alexander I was in no hurry to open the memorial hall. But Nicholas I, immediately after ascending the throne, hastened to open it. The architectural design of the hall was entrusted to the architect Carlo Rossi. To create it, he combined a suite of six rooms into one room. The project he created was approved on May 12, 1826. The 1812 gallery was opened on December 25, the fourteenth anniversary of the expulsion of the French army from Russia. At the time of opening, 236 portraits of World War II participants hung on the walls. Many years later there were 332 of them.

In early January 1827, Nicholas I entrusted Karl Rossi with remodeling the apartments of Empress Maria Feodorovna in the Winter Palace. The projects were ready by early March. But due to his own illness, the architect took six weeks off. Returning from a well-deserved rest, he learned that the work had been transferred Auguste Montferrand .

On December 25, 1827, the solemn consecration of the Gallery took place, described in the journal “Domestic Notes”:

“This gallery was consecrated in the presence of the imperial family and all the generals, officers and soldiers who had medals for 1812 and for the capture of Paris. The cavaliers of these foot guards were assembled in St. George's Hall, and the horse guards in Belaya... The Sovereign Emperor deigned to give instructions on where to store in future... the banners of the Life Guard regiments. They are placed in both corners of the main entrance under the inscriptions of memorable places... on which they once fluttered with unwavering glory.
...All the lower ranks, gathered here, were allowed into the gallery, where they passed in front of the images ... of Alexander and the generals - who led them repeatedly to the field of honor and victories, in front of the images of their valiant military leaders, who shared their labors and dangers with them...” [Cit. from: 2, p. 489]

After the opening of the gallery, Carl Rossi designed the rooms around it. The architects conceived the Advance Hall, the Armorial Hall, the Petrovsky and the Field Marshal Halls. After 1833, these premises were completed by Auguste Montferrand.

From 1833 to 1845, the Winter Palace was equipped with an optical telegraph. For him, a telegraph tower was equipped on the roof of the building, which is still clearly visible from Palace Bridge. From here the tsar had connections with Kronstadt, Gatchina, Tsarskoye Selo and even Warsaw. The telegraph workers were housed in the room below it, in the attic.

Fire in the Winter Palace, 1837

On December 17, 1837, a fire broke out in the Winter Palace. They could not extinguish it for three days, all this time the property taken out of the palace was piled around Alexander Column. It was impossible to see every little detail of all the things piled up on Palace Square. Here lay expensive furniture, porcelain, silverware. And despite the lack of adequate security, only a silver coffee pot and a gilded bracelet were missing. Thus, many things were saved. The coffee pot was discovered a few days later, and the bracelet was discovered in the spring, when the snow melted. The palace building was so damaged that it was considered almost impossible to restore it. All that remained of it were the stone walls and vaults of the first floor.

13 soldiers and firefighters died while rescuing property.

On December 25, the Commission for the restoration of the Winter Palace was created. The restoration of the facades and decoration of the ceremonial interiors was entrusted to the architect V. P. Stasov. The personal chambers of the imperial family were entrusted to A.P. Bryullov. General supervision of the construction was carried out by A. Staubert.

The Frenchman A. de Custine wrote:

« Incredible, superhuman efforts were needed to complete the construction within the time appointed by the emperor. Work on interior finishing continued in the most severe frosts. In total, there were six thousand workers at the construction site, many of whom died every day, but these unfortunates were immediately replaced by others, who in turn were destined to die soon. And the only purpose of these countless victims was to fulfill the royal whim...
In severe frosts of 25-30 degrees, six thousand unknown martyrs, unrewarded in any way, forced against their will only by obedience, which is the innate, forcefully instilled virtue of the Russians, were locked in the palace halls, where the temperature, due to the increased furnace for speedy drying, reached 30 degrees. . And the unfortunate ones, entering and leaving this palace of death, which, thanks to their sacrifices, was supposed to turn into a palace of vanity, splendor and pleasure, experienced a temperature difference of 50-60 degrees.
Work in the mines of the Urals was much less dangerous for human life, and yet the workers involved in the construction of the palace were not criminals, like those who were sent to the mines. I was told that the unfortunate people who worked in the most heated halls had to put some kind of ice caps on their heads in order to be able to withstand this monstrous heat without losing consciousness and the ability to continue their work..."[Cit. from: 2, p. 554]

For a long time it was believed that after the fire, the facades of the Winter Palace were recreated exactly the same as they were intended by Rastrelli. But in the article “Why Rastrelli was corrected,” historian Z. F. Semyonova described in detail the changes made and pointed out their reasons. It turned out that the northern façade of the building had been significantly altered. The semicircular pediments were replaced with triangular ones, and the design of the stucco decorations changed. The number of columns has increased, which are spaced evenly in each pier. Such rhythmicity and orderliness of the columns is not characteristic of Rastrelli’s Baroque style.

Particularly indicative are the changes in the design of the Jordan entrance. The absence of bending of the entablature, which is replaced by supporting beams and load-bearing columns, is clearly visible here. In his practice, Rastrelli never used such a technique.

The “corrections” in the style of the author of the Winter Palace are associated primarily with a different understanding of the architecture of Russian architects of the mid-19th century. They perceived Baroque as bad taste, diligently correcting it into the correct classical forms.

The layout of the building, created at this time, was preserved almost unchanged until 1917. The wooden bell towers built under Paul I were not recreated.

The celebration of the restoration of the Winter Palace took place in March 1839. A. de Custine visited the restored Winter Palace:

“It was an extravaganza... The brilliance of the main gallery in the Winter Palace positively dazzled me. It is all covered with gold, whereas before the fire it was painted white... Even more worthy of surprise than the sparkling golden dance hall seemed to me the gallery in which dinner was served” [Cit. from: 3, p. 36]

The gallery of 1812 was recreated with changes by the architect Stasov. He increased its length and removed the arches dividing the room into three parts.

Due to the fire, the statues on the roof of the Winter Palace cracked and began to crumble. In 1840 they were restored under the direction of the sculptor V. Demut-Malinovsky.

On the ground floor, mezzanines were built along the entire eastern gallery, separated by brick walls. The corridor that formed between them began to be called the kitchen corridor.

Winter Palace, 1841

The gates blocking the entrance to the courtyard were also restored. They exactly repeated the appearance of the gate created by Felten.

Catherine's rooms under Nicholas I began to be called “Prussian-royal”. The Emperor's son-in-law, the Prussian King Frederick William IV, used to stay here. After the fire, the former rooms of Maria Feodorovna became the Russian Department of the Hermitage, and after the construction of the New Hermitage building - a hotel for high-ranking persons. They were called the "Second Spare Half".

In general, “halves” in the Winter Palace were called a system of rooms for the residence of one person. Typically these rooms were grouped on one floor around a staircase. For example, the emperor's apartments were on the third floor, and the empress's on the second. They were united by a common staircase. The room system included everything necessary for a luxurious life. Thus, half of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna included the Malachite, Pink and Crimson living rooms, the Arab, Pompeian and Great dining rooms, an office, a bedroom, a boudoir, a garden, a bathroom and a pantry, a Diamond and a Passage room. The first six rooms were the state rooms in which the Empress received guests.

In addition to the halves of Nicholas I and his wife, in the Winter Palace there were halves of the heir, grand dukes, grand duchesses, the minister of the court, the first and second reserve for the temporary stay of the highest persons and members of the imperial family. As the number of Romanov family members increased, the number of spare halves also increased. At the beginning of the 20th century there were five of them.

The central part of the second floor of the facade of the Winter Palace from Palace Square is occupied by the Alexander Hall. To his left is the White Hall, recreated by the architect Bryullov on the site of the rooms of the children of Paul I. In 1841, it became part of the apartments of Maria Alexandrovna, the wife of the heir to the throne, the future Emperor Alexander II. Maria Alexandrovna's chambers also consisted of seven more rooms, including the Golden Living Room, the windows of which overlooked Palace Square and the Admiralty. The White Hall was used for receptions. Here tables were set and dances were held.

In the 1860s, the entrance gate became very dilapidated. They decided to replace them, architect Andrey Ivanovich Stackenschneider proposed a project for cast iron gates. But this project was not implemented.

In 1869, gas lighting appeared in the palace instead of candlelight. Since 1882, the installation of telephones in premises began. In the 1880s, a water supply system was built here (before that, everyone used washstands). At Christmas 1884-1885, electric lighting was tested in the halls of the Winter Palace; from 1888, gas lighting was gradually replaced by electric lighting. For this purpose, a power plant was built in the second hall of the Hermitage, which for 15 years was the largest in Europe.

The Winter Palace became the site of an attempt on the life of Emperor Alexander II. The terrorist Stepan Nikolaevich Khalturin planned to blow up the Tsar while he was having breakfast in the Yellow Drawing Room. To do this, Khalturin got a job as a carpenter in the palace and settled in a small room near the carpentry shop. This room was located on the ground floor, above which the palace guard room was located. Above the cardguard was the Yellow Living Room. Khalturin planned to blow it up using dynamite, which he carried piece by piece into his room. According to his calculations, the force of the explosion should have been enough to destroy the ceilings of two floors and kill the emperor. The explosive device was detonated on February 5, 1880, at 20 minutes past seven in the morning. The royal family was delayed; by the time of the explosion they did not even have time to reach the Yellow Drawing Room. But the Life Guardsmen of the Finnish Regiment who were in the guardhouse suffered. 11 people were killed, 47 were injured.

Winter Palace, garden fence, 1900s

After the death of Alexander II in 1881, the attitude of the royal family towards the Winter Palace changed. Before this tragedy, it was perceived by the emperors as a home, as a place where it was safe. But Alexander III treated the Winter Palace differently. Here he saw his mortally wounded father. The emperor also remembered the explosion of 1880, which means he did not feel safe here. In addition, the huge Winter Palace no longer met the requirements for comfortable housing at the end of the 19th century. Gradually, the imperial residence became only a place for official receptions, while tsars more often lived in other places, in the suburbs of St. Petersburg.

Alexander III made Anichkov Palace his official residence in St. Petersburg. The state rooms of the Winter Palace were open to him for excursions, which were arranged for high school students and students. Balls under Alexander III were not held here. This tradition was resumed by Nicholas II, but the rules for conducting them were changed.

In 1884, the architect Nikolai Gornostaev began designing the new gates of the Winter Palace. He took Steckenschneider's project as a basis. He developed projects for both the entrance gate and the fence for the ramps leading to the Commandant, Her Imperial Majesty and His Imperial Majesty, the Front (in the courtyard) entrances. One of the projects was approved, but it was carried out by the owner of the furniture company, artist Roman Meltzer. This became his first major work. Meltzer slightly reworked Gornostaev’s project, presenting not only the drawings, but also a life-size wooden model for consideration to the highest officials. After their approval, the gates and fences were manufactured at the San Galli iron foundry.

At the end of the 1880s, the architect Gornostaev landscaped the courtyard of the Winter Palace. A garden was created in its central part, where oaks, lindens, maples and white American ash were planted. The garden was surrounded by a granite plinth, and a fountain was installed in its center.

One day, a fragment of one of the figures on the roof of the Winter Palace fell in front of the windows of the heir to the throne, the future Emperor Nicholas II. The statues were removed, and in the 1890s they were replaced by copper figures under the models of the sculptor N.P. Popov. Of the 102 original figures, only 27 were recreated, copying them three times. All vases were repeated from one single model. In 1910, the remains of the original sculptures were found during the construction of a residential building on the corner Zagorodny Prospekt and Bolshoy Cossack Lane. The heads of the statues are now kept in the Russian Museum.

Nicholas II lived in the Winter Palace until 1904. From that time on, the Tsarskoye Selo Alexander Palace became his permanent place of residence. The Winter Palace became a place for ceremonial receptions, ceremonial dinners, and the place where the king stayed during short visits to the city.

With the outbreak of the First World War, the building was given over to an infirmary. An operating room, therapeutic room, examination room and other services were opened in the Winter Palace. The armorial hall became a ward for the wounded. They were looked after by Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, the Tsar's eldest daughters, and court ladies.

In the summer of 1917, the Winter Palace became the meeting place of the Provisional Government, which had previously been located in Mariinsky Palace. In July, Alexander Fedorovich Kerensky became chairman of the Provisional Government. It was located in the chambers of Alexander III - in the northwestern part of the palace, on the third floor, with windows overlooking the Admiralty and the Neva. The provisional government was located in the chambers of Nicholas II and his wife - on the second floor, under the apartments of Alexander III. The meeting room became the Malachite Living Room.

Before the First World War, the Winter Palace was repainted red-brick. It was against this background that the revolutionary events took place on Palace Square in 1917. On the morning of October 25, Kerensky left the Winter Palace to join the troops outside Petrograd. On the night of October 25-26, a detachment of sailors and Red Army soldiers entered the building through the entrance of Her Imperial Majesty. On October 26, 1917, at 1:50 a.m., the ministers of the Provisional Government were arrested in the Winter Palace. Subsequently, this entrance to the palace, as well as the staircase behind it, was called October.

Winter Palace after 1917, State Hermitage Museum

Before the Bolshevik Revolution, the semi-basement floor of the Winter Palace was occupied by a wine cellar. Centuries-old cognacs, Spanish, Portuguese, Hungarian and other wines were stored here. According to the City Duma, a fifth of the total supply of alcohol in St. Petersburg was stored in the basements of the Winter Palace. On November 3, 1917, when wine pogroms began in the city, the storage facilities of the former royal residence were also damaged. From the memoirs of Larisa Reisner about the events in the cellars of the Winter Palace:

“They filled them with firewood, walled them up first in one brick, then in two bricks - nothing helps. Every night they make a hole somewhere and suck, lick, pull out whatever they can. Some kind of frenzied, naked, insolent voluptuousness attracts one crowd after another to the forbidden wall. With tears in his eyes, Sergeant Major Krivoruchenko, who was assigned to protect the ill-fated barrels, told me about the despair, about the complete powerlessness that he experienced at night, defending alone, sober, with his few guards against the persistent, all-pervasive lust of the crowd. Now they have decided this: a machine gun will be inserted into each new hole.”

Winter Palace, modern look

But that didn't help either. In the end, it was decided to destroy the wine on the spot:

“...Then the firefighters were called. They turned on the machines, pumped up the basements full of water and started pumping everything into the Neva. Muddy streams flowed out of Zimny: there was wine, water, and dirt - everything was mixed up... This story dragged on for a day or two, until nothing remained of the wine cellars in Zimny.”

Winter Palace, modern view

IN Soviet time The Winter Palace began to belong to the state museum - the Hermitage. The building was rebuilt again, now for the needs of the museum, in 1925-1926. Then the bay windows above the entrances from Palace Square were dismantled. In 1927, during the restoration of the facade, 13 layers of different paints were discovered. Then the walls of the Winter Palace were repainted gray-green, the columns white, and the stucco almost black. At the same time, the mezzanines and partitions of the eastern gallery of the first floor were dismantled. It was called the Rastrelli Gallery, and temporary exhibitions began to be organized here.

During the blockade, in the spring of 1942, a vegetable garden was built in the courtyard garden of the Winter Palace. Potatoes, rutabaga, and beets were planted here. There was a similar vegetable garden in the Hanging Garden.

In 1955, P. Ya. Kann provided the following information about the palace: it had 1050 front and living rooms, 1945 windows, 1786 doors, 117 staircases.

Currently, the Winter Palace, together with the Hermitage Theater, the Small, New and Large Hermitages, forms a single complex " State Hermitage Museum ". Its semi-basement floor is occupied by museum production workshops.

The Winter Palace is the largest palace building in St. Petersburg. Its dimensions and magnificent decoration make it possible to rightfully classify it as one of the most striking monuments of the St. Petersburg Baroque. “The Winter Palace as a building, as a royal dwelling, perhaps has nothing like it in all of Europe. With its enormity, its architecture, it depicts a powerful people who have so recently entered the midst of educated nations, and with its internal splendor it reminds of the inexhaustible life that boils in the interior of Russia... The Winter Palace for us is a representative of everything domestic, Russian, ours,” - this is what V. A. Zhukovsky wrote about the Winter Palace. The history of this architectural monument is rich in turbulent historical events.

At the beginning of the 18th century, in the place where the Winter Palace now stands, construction was permitted only to naval officials. Peter I took advantage of this right, being a shipwright under the name of Peter Alekseev, and in 1708 he built a small house in the Dutch style for himself and his family. Ten years later, by order of the future emperor, a canal was dug in front of the side facade of the palace, named (after the palace) the Winter Canal.

In 1711, especially for the wedding of Peter I and Catherine, the architect Georg Mattarnovi, on the orders of the Tsar, began rebuilding the wooden palace into a stone one. During the work, the architect Mattarnovi was removed from work and the construction was headed by Domenico Trezzini, an Italian architect of Swiss origin. In 1720, Peter I and his entire family moved from their summer residence to their winter residence. In 1723, the Senate was transferred to the Winter Palace. And in January 1725, Peter I died here (in a room on the first floor behind the current second window, counting from the Neva).

Subsequently, Empress Anna Ioannovna considered the Winter Palace too small and in 1731 entrusted its reconstruction to F.B. Rastrelli, who offered her his own project for the reconstruction of the Winter Palace. According to his project, it was necessary to purchase the houses that stood at that time on the site occupied by the current palace and belonged to Count Apraksin, the Maritime Academy, Raguzinsky and Chernyshev. Anna Ioanovna approved the project, the houses were bought up, demolished, and work began to boil. In 1735, construction of the palace was completed, and the Empress moved into it to live. Here, on July 2, 1739, Princess Anna Leopoldovna's engagement to Prince Anton-Urich took place. After the death of Anna Ioannovna, the young Emperor Ivan Antonovich was brought here, who stayed here until November 25, 1741, when Elizaveta Petrovna took power into her own hands.

Elizaveta Petrovna also wished to remodel the imperial residence to her taste. On January 1, 1752, she decided to expand the Winter Palace, after which the neighboring areas of Raguzinsky and Yaguzhinsky were purchased. At the new location, Rastrelli added new buildings. According to the project he drew up, these buildings were to be attached to existing ones and be decorated in the same style. In December 1752, the Empress wished to increase the height of the Winter Palace from 14 to 22 meters. Rastrelli was forced to redo the design of the building, after which he decided to build it in a new location. But Elizaveta Petrovna refused to move the new Winter Palace. As a result, the architect decided to rebuild the entire building. The new project - the next building of the Winter Palace - was signed by Elizaveta Petrovna on June 16, 1754.

Construction lasted eight long years, which coincided with the end of the reign of Elizabeth Petrovna and the short reign of Peter III.

The story of Peter III’s arrival at the palace is interesting. After Elizabeth’s death, 15 thousand dresses, many thousands of shoes and stockings remained in her wardrobe, and only six silver rubles were left in the state treasury. Peter III, who replaced Elizabeth on the throne, wished to immediately move into his new residence. But Palace Square was cluttered with piles of bricks, boards, logs, barrels of lime and similar construction debris. The capricious disposition of the new sovereign was known, and the Chief of Police found a way out: in St. Petersburg it was announced that all ordinary people had the right to take whatever they wanted on Palace Square. A contemporary (A. Bolotov) writes in his memoirs that almost all of St. Petersburg with wheelbarrows, carts, and some with sleighs (despite the proximity of Easter!) came running to Palace Square. Clouds of sand and dust rose above her. The inhabitants grabbed everything: boards, bricks, clay, lime, and barrels... By evening the square was completely cleared. Nothing interfered with the ceremonial entry of Peter III into the Winter Palace.

In the summer of 1762, Peter III was overthrown from the throne. Construction of the Winter Palace was completed under Catherine II. In the autumn of 1763, the Empress returned from Moscow to St. Petersburg after the coronation celebrations and became the sovereign mistress of the new palace.

First of all, Catherine removed Rastrelli from work, and Ivan Ivanovich Betskoy, the illegitimate son of Field Marshal Prince Ivan Yuryevich Trubetskoy and personal secretary of Catherine II, became the manager at the construction site. The Empress moved the chambers to the southwestern part of the palace; under her rooms she ordered the chambers of her favorite G. G. Orlov to be placed.

On the side of Palace Square, the Throne Hall was equipped, and a waiting room appeared in front of it - the White Hall. A dining room was located behind the White Hall. The Bright Office was adjacent to it. The dining room was followed by the State Bedchamber, which a year later became the Diamond Chamber. In addition, the Empress ordered a library, an office, a boudoir, two bedrooms and a restroom to be equipped for herself. Under Catherine, a winter garden and the Romanov Gallery were also built in the Winter Palace. At the same time, the formation of St. George's Hall was completed. In 1764, in Berlin, through agents, Catherine acquired a collection of 225 works by Dutch and Flemish artists from the merchant I. Gotzkovsky. Most of the paintings were placed in secluded apartments of the palace, which received the French name “Hermitage” (“place of solitude”).

The fourth, currently existing palace built by Elizabeth was conceived and implemented in the form of a closed quadrangle with a vast courtyard. Its facades face the Neva, towards the Admiralty and the square, in the center of which F.B. Rastrelli intended to erect an equestrian statue of Peter I.

The facades of the palace are divided into two tiers by an entablature. They are decorated with columns of the Ionic and Composite orders. The columns of the upper tier unite the second, front, and third floors.

The complex rhythm of the columns, the richness and variety of forms of the platbands, the abundance of stucco details, the many decorative vases and statues located above the parapet and above the numerous pediments create the decorative decoration of the building, which is exceptional in its pomp and splendor.

The southern facade is cut through by three entrance arches, which emphasizes its importance as the main one. The entrance arches lead to the front courtyard, where the central entrance to the palace was located in the center of the northern building.

The main Jordan Staircase is located in the northeast corner of the building. On the second floor along the northern facade there were five large halls, the so-called “anti-chambers,” located in an enfilade, behind them was a huge Throne Hall, and in the southwestern part was the palace theater.

Despite the fact that the Winter Palace was completed in 1762, work on decorating the interior was still underway for a long time. These works were entrusted to the best Russian architects Yu. M. Felten, J. B. Ballen-Delamot and A. Rinaldi.

In the 1780-1790s, work on remodeling the interior decoration of the palace was continued by I. E. Starov and G. Quarenghi. In general, the palace was remodeled and rebuilt an incredible number of times. Each new architect tried to bring something of his own, sometimes destroying what had already been built.

Throughout the lower floor there were galleries with arches. Galleries connected all parts of the palace. The premises on the sides of the galleries were of a service nature. There were storerooms, a guardhouse, and palace employees lived here.

The state halls and living quarters of members of the imperial family were located on the second floor and were built in the Russian Baroque style - huge halls flooded with light, double rows of large windows and mirrors, lush Rococo decor. The upper floor mainly housed the apartments of the courtiers.

The palace was also subject to destruction. For example, on December 17-19, 1837, there was a strong fire that completely destroyed the beautiful decoration of the Winter Palace, of which only a charred skeleton remained. They could not put out the flames for three days; all this time, the property taken from the palace was piled up around the Alexander Column. As a result of the disaster, the interiors of Rastrelli, Quarenghi, Montferrand, and Rossi were destroyed. Restoration work began immediately and lasted two years. They were led by architects V.P. Stasov and A.P. Bryullov. According to the order of Nicholas I, the palace was to be restored the same as it was before the fire. However, not everything was so easy to do, for example, only some interiors created or restored after the fire of 1837 by A.P. Bryullov have reached us in their original form.

On February 5, 1880, Narodnaya Volya member S.N. Khalturin, with the aim of assassinating Alexander II, carried out an explosion in the Winter Palace. In this case, eight guard soldiers were killed and forty-five were wounded, but neither the emperor nor his family members were injured.

At the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries, the interior design was constantly changing and adding new elements. These, in particular, are the interiors of the chambers of Empress Maria Alexandrovna, wife of Alexander II, created according to the designs of G. A. Bosse (Red Boudoir) and V. A. Schreiber (Golden Living Room), as well as the library of Nicholas II (author A. F. Krasovsky). Among the updated interiors, the most interesting was the decoration of the Nicholas Hall, which contained a large equestrian portrait of Emperor Nicholas I by the artist F. Kruger.

For a long time, the Winter Palace was the residence of Russian emperors. After the assassination of Alexander II by terrorists, Emperor Alexander III moved his residence to Gatchina. From that moment on, only special ceremonies were held in the Winter Palace. With the accession of Nicholas II to the throne in 1894, the imperial family returned to the palace.

The most significant changes in the history of the Winter Palace occurred in 1917, along with the Bolsheviks coming to power. A lot of valuables were stolen and damaged by sailors and workers while the palace was under their control. The former chambers of Alexander III were damaged by a direct hit from a shell fired from a cannon at the Peter and Paul Fortress. Only a few days later, the Soviet government declared the Winter Palace and the Hermitage state museums and took the buildings under protection. Soon, valuable palace property and Hermitage collections were sent to Moscow and hidden in the Kremlin and in the building of the Historical Museum.

A curious story is connected with the October Revolution in the Winter Palace: after the storming of the palace, the Red Guard, who was tasked with placing guards to protect the Winter Palace, decided to familiarize himself with the placement of guards in pre-revolutionary times. He was surprised to learn that one of the posts had long been located on an unremarkable alley of the palace garden (the royal family called it “Own” and by this name the garden was known to St. Petersburg residents). An inquisitive Red Guard found out the history of this post. It turned out that once Tsarina Catherine II, going out to the Razvodnaya platform in the morning, saw a sprouted flower there. To prevent it from being trampled by soldiers and passers-by, Catherine, returning from a walk, ordered a guard to be placed at the flower. And when the flower withered, the queen forgot to cancel her order to keep the guard at this place. And since then, for about a hundred and fifty years, a guard stood at this place, although there was no longer a flower, no Queen Catherine, or even the Drawing Platform.

In 1918, part of the premises of the Winter Palace was given over to the Museum of the Revolution, which entailed the reconstruction of their interiors. The Romanov Gallery, which contained portraits of sovereigns and members of the House of Romanov, was completely liquidated. Many of the palace's chambers were occupied by a reception center for prisoners of war, a children's colony, a headquarters for organizing mass celebrations, etc. The Armorial Hall was used for theatrical performances, and the Nicholas Hall was converted into a cinema. In addition, congresses and conferences of various public organizations were repeatedly held in the halls of the palace.

When the Hermitage and palace collections returned from Moscow to Petrograd at the end of 1920, there was simply no place for many of them. As a result, hundreds of works of painting and sculpture were used to decorate the mansions and apartments of party, Soviet and military leaders, holiday homes of officials and members of their families. Since 1922, the premises of the Winter Palace began to gradually be transferred to the Hermitage.

In the first days of the Great Patriotic War, many of the Hermitage’s valuables were urgently evacuated, some of them were hidden in the basements. To prevent fires in the museum buildings, the windows were bricked or shuttered. In some rooms, the parquet floors were covered with a layer of sand.

The Winter Palace was a major target. A large number of bombs and shells exploded near it, and several hit the building itself. Thus, on December 29, 1941, a shell crashed into the southern wing of the Winter Palace, overlooking the kitchen courtyard, damaging the iron rafters and roofing over an area of ​​three hundred square meters, and destroying the fire-fighting water supply installation located in the attic. An attic vault covering an area of ​​about six square meters was broken through. Another shell hit the podium in front of the Winter Palace and damaged the water main.

Despite the difficult conditions that existed in the besieged city, on May 4, 1942, the Leningrad City Executive Committee ordered construction trust No. 16 to carry out priority restoration work in the Hermitage, in which emergency restoration workshops took part. In the summer of 1942, the roof was covered in places where it had been damaged by shells, the formwork was partially repaired, broken skylights or iron sheets were installed, the destroyed metal rafters were replaced with temporary wooden ones, and the plumbing system was repaired.

On May 12, 1943, a bomb hit the Winter Palace building, partially destroying the roof over the St. George's Hall and metal rafter structures, and damaging the brickwork of the walls in the storeroom of the Department of the History of Russian Culture. In the summer of 1943, despite the shelling, they continued to seal the roof, ceilings, and skylights with tarred plywood. On January 2, 1944, another shell hit the Armorial Hall, severely damaging the decoration and destroying two ceilings. The shell also pierced the ceiling of the Nicholas Hall. But already in August 1944, the Soviet government decided to restore all the museum buildings. Restoration work required enormous efforts and lasted for many years. But, despite all the losses, the Winter Palace remains an outstanding monument of Baroque architecture.

Nowadays, the Winter Palace, together with the buildings of the Small, Large and New Hermitages and the Hermitage Theater, forms a single palace complex, which has few equals in world architecture. In artistic and urban planning terms, it belongs to the highest achievements of Russian architecture. All the halls of this palace ensemble, which was built over many years, are occupied by the State Hermitage Museum - the largest museum in the world, possessing huge collections of works of art.

In the appearance of the Winter Palace, which was created, as the decree on its construction stated, “for the united glory of all Russia,” in its elegant, festive appearance, in the magnificent decoration of its facades, the artistic and compositional concept of the architect Rastrelli is revealed - a deep architectural connection with the city on the Neva, became the capital Russian Empire, with all the character of the surrounding urban landscape, which continues to this day.

Palace Square

Any tour of the Winter Palace begins on Palace Square. It has its own history, which is no less interesting than the history of Winter itself. The square was formed in 1754 during the construction of the Winter Palace according to the design of V. Rastrelli. An important role in its formation was played by K. I. Rossi, who in 1819-1829 created the General Staff building and the Ministry building and connected them into a single whole with a magnificent Arc de Triomphe. The Alexander Column took its place in the ensemble of Palace Square in 1830-1834, in honor of the victory in the War of 1812. It is noteworthy that V. Rastrelli intended to place a monument to Peter I in the center of the square. The ensemble of Palace Square is completed by the building of the Headquarters of the Guards Corps, created in 1837-1843 by the architect A. P. Bryullov.

The palace was conceived and built in the form of a closed quadrangle, with a vast courtyard. The Winter Palace is quite large and clearly stands out from the surrounding houses.

Countless white columns either gather in groups (especially picturesque and expressive at the corners of the building), then thin out and part, revealing windows framed by platbands with lion masks and cupids' heads. There are dozens of decorative vases and statues on the balustrade. The corners of the building are bordered by columns and pilasters.

Each facade of the Winter Palace is made in its own way. The northern facade, facing the Neva, stretches like a more or less even wall, without noticeable protrusions. The southern façade, facing Palace Square and having seven divisions, is the main one. Its center is cut through by three entrance arches. Is there a front yard behind them? where in the middle of the northern building there used to be the main entrance to the palace. Of the side facades, the most interesting is the western one, facing the Admiralty and the square on which Rastrelli intended to place the equestrian statue of Peter I cast by his father. Each casing decorating the palace is unique. This is due to the fact that the mass, consisting of a mixture of crushed bricks and lime mortar, was cut and processed by hand. All stucco decorations on the facades were made on site.

The Winter Palace was always painted in bright colors. The original coloring of the palace was pink and yellow, as illustrated by drawings from the 18th - first quarter of the 19th centuries.

Of the interior spaces of the palace created by Rastrelli, the Jordan Staircase and part of the Great Church have retained their Baroque appearance. The main staircase is located in the northeast corner of the building. On it you can see various decorative details - columns, mirrors, statues, intricate gilded stucco molding, a huge lampshade created by Italian painters. The staircase, divided into two ceremonial flights, led to the main, Northern enfilade, which consisted of five large halls, behind which in the northwestern risalit there was a huge Throne Hall, and in the southwestern part - the palace Theater.

The Great Church, located in the southeast corner of the building, also deserves special attention. Initially, the church was consecrated in honor of the Resurrection of Christ (1762) and again in the name of the Savior, the Image Not Made by Hands (1763). Its walls are decorated with stucco - an elegant floral pattern. The three-tier iconostasis is decorated with icons and picturesque panels depicting biblical scenes. The Evangelists on the ceiling vaults were later painted by F.A. Bruni. Now nothing reminds of the former purpose of the church hall, destroyed in the 1920s, except for the golden dome and the large picturesque ceiling by F. Fontebasso, depicting the Resurrection of Christ.

White Hall

It was created by A.P. Bryullov on the site of a number of premises that had three semicircular windows along the facade in the center, and three rectangular windows on the sides. This circumstance gave the architect the idea of ​​dividing the room into three compartments and highlighting the middle one with particularly luxurious treatment. The hall is separated from the side parts by arches on projecting pylons, decorated with pilasters, and the central window and the opposite door are emphasized by Corinthian columns, above which are placed four statues - female figures personifying the arts. The hall is covered with semi-circular vaults. The wall opposite the central windows is designed with an arcature and above each semicircle there are pairs of bas-relief figures of Juno and Jupiter, Diana and Apollo, Ceres and Mercury and other deities of Olympus.

The vault and all parts of the ceiling above the cornice are decorated with caissons and stucco molding in the same late-classical style, rich in decorative elements.

The side compartments are decorated in the spirit of the Italian Renaissance. Here, under the common crowning cornice, a second smaller order with Tuscan pilasters, covered with small moldings with grotesque ornaments, is introduced. Above the pilasters there is a wide frieze with figures of children engaged in music and dancing, hunting and fishing, harvesting and winemaking, or playing at sailing and war. This combination of architectural elements of different scales and overloading the hall with ornaments are characteristic of the classicism of the 1830s, but the white color gives the hall integrity.

St. George's Hall and Military Gallery

Experts call the St. George, or Great Throne Hall, created according to Quarenghi’s design, the most perfect interior. In order to create the St. George's Hall, a special building had to be added to the center of the eastern facade of the palace. Colored marble and gilded bronze were used in the design of this room, which enriched the front suite. At the end of it, on a dais, there used to be a large throne made by the master P. Azhi. Other famous architects also took part in the design of the palace interiors. In 1826, according to the design of K.I. Rossi, a Military Gallery was built in front of St. George's Hall.

The military gallery is a kind of monument to the heroic military past of the Russian people. It contains 332 portraits of generals, participants in the Patriotic War of 1812 and the foreign campaign of 1813-1814. The portraits were painted by the famous English artist J. Dow with the participation of Russian painters A.V. Polyakov and V.A. Golike. Most of the portraits were made from life, but since in 1819, when the work began, many were no longer alive, some portraits were painted from earlier, surviving images. The gallery occupies a place of honor in the palace and is directly adjacent to the St. George's Hall. The architect K. I. Rossi, who built it, destroyed the six small rooms that previously existed here. The gallery was illuminated through glazed openings in the vaults supported by arches. The arches rested on groups of double columns that stood against the longitudinal walls. Portraits were placed in five rows on the walls in simple gilded frames. On one of the end walls, under a canopy, was placed an equestrian portrait of Alexander I by J. Doe. After the fire of 1837, it was replaced by the same portrait by F. Kruger; it is his painting that is in the hall today; on its sides there is an image of the King of Prussia, Frederick William III, also painted by Kruger, and a portrait of the Austrian Emperor Franz I by P. Kraft. If you look at the door leading to the St. George's Hall, then on its sides you can see portraits of Field Marshals M.I. Kutuzov and M.B. Barclay de Tolly by Doe.

In the 1830s, A. S. Pushkin often visited the gallery. He immortalized it in the poem “Commander,” dedicated to Barclay de Tolly:

The Russian Tsar has a chamber in his palace:
She is not rich in gold or velvet;
But from top to bottom, all the way around,
With your brush free and wide
It was painted by a quick-eyed artist.
There are no rural nymphs or virgin Madonnas here,
No fauns with cups, no full-breasted wives,
No dancing, no hunting, but all cloaks and swords,
Yes, faces full of military courage.
The artist placed the crowd in a crowd
Here are the leaders of our people's forces,
Covered with the glory of a wonderful campaign
And the eternal memory of the twelfth year.

The fire of 1837 did not spare the gallery, however, fortunately, all the portraits were carried out by soldiers of the guards regiments.

V.P. Stasov, who restored the gallery, basically retained its former character: he repeated the treatment of the walls with double Corinthian columns, left the same arrangement of portraits, and retained the color scheme. But some details of the hall's composition were changed. Stasov extended the gallery by 12 meters. A balcony was placed above the wide crowning cornice for passage to the choirs of adjacent halls, for which purpose arches resting on columns were eliminated, rhythmically breaking the too long vault into parts.

After the Great Patriotic War, the gallery was restored, and four additional portraits of palace grenadiers, veterans who served in the campaign of 1812-1814 as ordinary soldiers, were placed in it. These works were also carried out by J. Doe.

Petrovsky Hall

Peter's Hall is also known as the Small Throne Room. Decorated with particular splendor in the spirit of late classicism, it was created in 1833 by the architect A. A. Montferrand. After the fire, the hall was restored by V.P. Stasov, and its original appearance was preserved almost unchanged. The main difference in later finishing is related to the treatment of the walls. Previously, the panels on the side walls were divided by one pilaster, now there are two of them. There was no border around each panel, a large double-headed eagle in the center, and on the upholstery of scarlet velvet, bronze gilded double-headed eagles of the same size were mounted in diagonal directions.

The hall is dedicated to the memory of Peter I. Crossed Latin monograms of Peter, double-headed eagles and crowns are included in the motifs of the stucco ornament of the capitals of columns and pilasters, the frieze on the walls, in the ceiling painting and decoration of the entire hall. On two walls there are images of the Battle of Poltava and the Battle of Lesnaya, in the center of the compositions is the figure of Peter I (artists - B. Medici and P. Scotti).

255 years ago (1754) construction of the Winter Palace began in St. Petersburg, which was completed in 1762.

One of the most famous buildings in St. Petersburg is the Winter Palace building, located on Palace Square and built in the Baroque style.

The history of the Winter Palace begins with the reign of Peter I.

The very first, then still Winter House, was built for Peter I in 1711 on the banks of the Neva. The first Winter Palace was two-story, with a tiled roof and a high porch. In 1719-1721, the architect Georg Mattornovi built a new palace for Peter I.

Empress Anna Ioannovna considered the Winter Palace too small and did not want to live in it. She entrusted the construction of the new Winter Palace to the architect Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli. For new construction, the houses of Count Apraksin, Raguzinsky and Chernyshev, located on the embankment of the Neva River, as well as the building of the Maritime Academy were purchased. They were demolished, and in their place by 1735 a new Winter Palace was built. At the end of the 18th century, the Hermitage Theater was erected on the site of the old palace.

Empress Elizaveta Petrovna also wished to remodel the imperial residence to her taste. The construction of the new palace was entrusted to the architect Rastrelli. The design of the Winter Palace created by the architect was signed by Elizaveta Petrovna on June 16, 1754.

In the summer of 1754, Elizaveta Petrovna issued a personal decree to begin construction of the palace. The required amount - about 900 thousand rubles - was taken from the "tavern" money (collection from the drinking trade). The previous palace was dismantled. During construction, the courtyard moved to a temporary wooden palace built by Rastrelli on the corner of Nevsky and Moika.

The palace was distinguished by its incredible size for those times, lavish exterior decoration and luxurious interior decoration.

The Winter Palace is a three-story building, rectangular in plan, with a huge front courtyard inside. The main facades of the palace face the embankment and the square that was formed later.

When creating the Winter Palace, Rastrelli designed each facade differently, based on specific conditions. The northern facade, facing the Neva, stretches like a more or less even wall, without noticeable protrusions. From the river side, it is perceived as an endless two-tiered colonnade. The southern façade, facing Palace Square and having seven divisions, is the main one. Its center is highlighted by a wide, lavishly decorated risalit, cut through by three entrance arches. Behind them is the front courtyard, where in the middle of the northern building there was the main entrance to the palace.

Along the perimeter of the palace roof there is a balustrade with vases and statues (the original stone ones were replaced by a brass knockout in 1892-1894).

The length of the palace (along the Neva) is 210 meters, width - 175 meters, height - 22 meters. total area The palace is 60 thousand square meters, it has more than 1000 halls, 117 different staircases.

The palace had two chains of state halls: along the Neva and in the center of the building. In addition to the state rooms, on the second floor there were living quarters for members of the imperial family. The first floor was occupied by utility and service premises. The upper floor mainly housed the apartments of the courtiers.

About four thousand employees lived here, they even had their own army - palace grenadiers and guards from the guards regiments. The palace had two churches, a theater, a museum, a library, a garden, an office, and a pharmacy. The halls of the palace were decorated with gilded carvings, luxurious mirrors, chandeliers, candelabra, and patterned parquet flooring.

Under Catherine II, a winter garden was organized in the Palace, where both northern and plants brought from the south grew, and the Romanov Gallery; At the same time, the formation of St. George's Hall was completed. Under Nicholas I, a gallery of 1812 was organized, where 332 portraits of participants in the Patriotic War were placed. The architect Auguste Montferrand added the Peter and Field Marshal halls to the palace.

In 1837, there was a fire in the Winter Palace. Many things were saved, but the building itself was badly damaged. But thanks to the architects Vasily Stasov and Alexander Bryullov, the building was restored within two years.

In 1869, gas lighting appeared in the palace instead of candlelight. Since 1882, the installation of telephones in premises began. In the 1880s, a water supply system was built in the Winter Palace. At Christmas 1884-1885, electric lighting was tested in the halls of the Winter Palace; from 1888, gas lighting was gradually replaced by electric lighting. For this purpose, a power plant was built in the second hall of the Hermitage, which for 15 years was the largest in Europe.

In 1904, Emperor Nicholas II moved from the Winter Palace to the Tsarskoye Selo Alexander Palace. The Winter Palace became the place for ceremonial receptions, state dinners, and the place where the Tsar stayed during short visits to the city.

Throughout the history of the Winter Palace as an imperial residence, its interiors were remodeled in accordance with fashion trends. The building itself changed the color of its walls several times. The Winter Palace was painted red, pink, yellow colors. Before the First World War, the palace was painted red brick.

During the First World War, there was an infirmary in the building of the Winter Palace. After the February Revolution of 1917, the Provisional Government worked in the Winter Palace. In the post-revolutionary years, various departments and institutions were located in the Winter Palace building. In 1922, part of the building was transferred to the Hermitage Museum.

In 1925 - 1926, the building was rebuilt again, this time for the needs of the museum.

During the Great Patriotic War, the Winter Palace suffered from air raids and artillery shelling. In the basements of the palace there was a dispensary for scientists and cultural figures who suffered from dystrophy. In 1945-1946, restoration work was carried out, at which time the entire Winter Palace became part of the Hermitage.

Currently, the Winter Palace, together with the Hermitage Theatre, the Small, New and Large Hermitages, forms a single museum complex, the State Hermitage.

Winter Palace. People and walls [History of the imperial residence, 1762–1917] Zimin Igor Viktorovich

Formation of half of Catherine II

Back in the second half of the 1750s. F.B. Rastrelli incorporated into the scheme of the Winter Palace the standard layout option that he used in the palaces of Tsarskoe Selo and Peterhof. The basement of the palace was used as servants' quarters or storage rooms. The ground floor of the palace housed service and utility rooms. The second floor (mezzanine) of the palace was intended to accommodate ceremonial, state halls and personal apartments of top officials. On the third floor of the palace, ladies-in-waiting, doctors and close servants were accommodated. This planning scheme assumed predominantly horizontal connections between the various living areas of the palace. The endless corridors of the Winter Palace became the material embodiment of these horizontal connections.

The heart of the palace became the chambers of the first person. At first, Rastrelli planned these chambers for Elizaveta Petrovna. The architect located the rooms of the aging empress in the sunny southeastern part of the palace. The windows of the Empress's private chambers faced Millionnaya Street. Petrov’s unpretentious daughter loved to sit by the window, looking at the bustle of the street. Apparently, taking into account precisely this form of women’s leisure and sunlight, so rare in our latitudes, Rastrelli planned the layout of the empress’s private rooms.

Peter III, and after him Catherine II, left Rastrelli's planning scheme in force, retaining the role of its residential center for the southeastern risalit of the Winter Palace. At the same time, Peter III retained the rooms in which Elizaveta Petrovna planned to live. For his hateful wife, the eccentric emperor designated chambers on the western side of the Winter Palace, the windows of which overlooked the industrial zone of the Admiralty, which since the time of Peter I had functioned as a shipyard.

E. Vigilius. Portrait of Catherine II in uniform l. - Guards Preobrazhensky Regiment. After 1762

After the coup on June 28, 1762, Catherine II lived in the Winter Palace for just a few days. The rest of the time she continued to live in the wooden Elizabethan Palace on the Moika.

Since Catherine II urgently needed to strengthen her precarious position with a legitimate coronation, she went to Moscow in August 1762 to be crowned in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin. The coronation took place on September 22, 1762.

It is impossible not to note the high pace of life of this woman, so atypical for that leisurely time. Then, in the first half of 1762, she not only organized a conspiracy against her husband, but also managed to secretly give birth to a child in April 1762, whose father was her lover G.G. Orlov. At the end of June 1762 there followed a coup, at the beginning of July - the “mysterious” death of Peter III and the coronation in September 1762. And for all this she had enough intelligence, strength, nerves and energy.

After Catherine II left for Moscow, construction work in the Winter Palace did not stop, but it was carried out by other people. These changes are associated with a number of circumstances. Firstly, a new reign always means new people. Catherine II removed many dignitaries of the Elizabethan era, including the architect F.B. Rastrelli. On August 20, 1762, Rastrelli was sent on leave as Elizabeth Petrovna’s man. Secondly, Catherine II considered the bizarre baroque an outdated style. At the subconscious level, she wanted her reign to be marked by visible stylistic changes, called classicism. Therefore, Rastrelli's vacation smoothly turned into his resignation.

Unknown artist. Oath of the Life Guards Izmailovsky Regiment June 28, 1762 First quarter of the 19th century.

Rastrelli was replaced by architects who had previously played second roles. These were those who worked in the new manner desired by Catherine II - J.-B. Vallin-Delamot, A. Rinaldi, and Y. Felten. That is, those architects who are usually attributed to the period of so-called early classicism. Let us note that all of them treated the completed areas of their predecessor’s work in the Winter Palace with great care. They did not affect the already completed Baroque façade of the Winter Palace at all. However, perhaps purely mercantile considerations also played a role here. There was simply no money for global changes to the newly built Winter Palace.

I. Mayer. Winter Palace from Vasilyevsky Island. 1796

M. Mikhaev. View of the Winter Palace from the east. 1750s

Nevertheless, this tradition continued later. Therefore, the Winter Palace to this day is a bizarre mixture of styles: the facade, the Great Church, and the Grand Staircase still retain Rastrelli's Baroque decor, but the rest of the rooms have been repeatedly altered. In the second half of the 18th century. these corrections and alterations were in the spirit of classicism. After the fire of 1837, many interior spaces were decorated in the historicist style.

Winter Palace. Pavilion Flashlight. Lithograph by Bayot based on a drawing by O. Montferrand. 1834

The new creative group began work in the Winter Palace in the fall of 1762. Thus, Yu. Felten, fulfilling the personal instructions of the Empress, decorated her chambers in a classicist style. The Diamond Room, or Diamond Peace, is best known from descriptions of it. We emphasize that no images of Catherine II’s personal chambers have reached us. At all. But numerous descriptions of them have been preserved.

As mentioned, back at the end of 1761, Peter III ordered “for the empress... to decorate the premises on the Admiralty side and build a staircase through all three floors.” Therefore, on the second floor of the western building of the Winter Palace, even under Peter III, J.-B. Vallin-Delamot began decorating the private chambers of Catherine II. These included a Bedroom, a Dressing Room, a Boudoir, and an Office. Yu. Felten also worked there, through whose work the Portrait and the “Bright Cabinet” appeared in a wooden bay window built above the entrance, which would later be called Saltykovsky.

Apparently, the empress liked the idea of ​​a three-light bay window. Even in the bustle of preparing for the coup, she was able to note and appreciate this “architectural element.” Therefore, after the cessation of work in the western part of the palace, the idea of ​​a “cabinet” materialized in the southwestern risalit, where the famous Lantern appeared above the entrance, later called the Commandant’s, - a small palace hall located above the entrance.

A watercolor by an unknown artist, “Catherine II on the balcony of the Winter Palace on the day of the coup,” dated to the end of the 18th century, has survived. This watercolor shows the scaffolding near the southwestern risalit of the palace. There is no flashlight yet, but there is a balcony covered from above with a hipped canopy. The place was cozy, and the Lantern, taking into account the St. Petersburg climate, was closed with solid walls. This cozy Lantern remained above the Commandant's Entrance until the 1920s.

By the beginning of 1763, Catherine II, having returned to St. Petersburg, finally finally decided on her place of residence in the huge Winter Palace. In March 1763, she ordered her chambers to be moved to the southwestern risalit, where the chambers of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna and Peter III had previously been.

There is no doubt that there was a clear political context to this decision. Catherine II, as a pragmatic and intelligent politician, integrated herself not only into the system of power, but also into the existing scheme of palace chambers. Then, in 1863, she took into account every little thing that could strengthen her position, including such as the continuity of the imperial chambers: from Elizabeth Petrovna to Peter III and to her - Empress Catherine II. Her decision to move her chambers to the high-status south-eastern corner of the Winter Palace was probably dictated by the desire to strengthen her precarious position, including through this “geographical method”. The chambers in which Elizaveta Petrovna and Peter III were supposed to live could only become her chambers. Accordingly, all the work carried out by J.-B. since the autumn of 1762. Wallen-Delamot and Yu. Felten in the western wing of the palace immediately turned away. So Catherine II did not live a single day in the rooms located along the western facade of the Winter Palace.

New work was carried out on a grand scale. This was no longer a minor cosmetic renovation undertaken by Peter III. In the southeastern risalit, a large-scale redevelopment of the interior began, when the newly erected walls were dismantled. When carrying out the work, the architects also took into account the nuances of the personal life of the 33-year-old empress. Directly under the personal chambers of Catherine II, on the mezzanine of the first floor, the rooms of her common-law husband at that time, Grigory Orlov, were located. There, on the mezzanine, right under the church altar, they built a bathhouse (soaphouse, or soapbox) with spacious and luxurious premises.

G.G. Orlov

G.A. Potemkin

The empress repeatedly mentioned this little soapbox in her intimate correspondence with her changing favorites. The favorites changed, but the soap bar remained as a secluded meeting place. For example, in February 1774, Catherine II wrote to G.A. Potemkin: “Darling, if you want to eat meat, know that now everything is ready in the bathhouse. And don’t take any food from there to yourself, otherwise the whole world will know that food is being prepared in the bathhouse.” In March 1774, the Empress reported to Potemkin about her conversation with Alexei Orlov, who knew well what the soap box was for: “... My answer was: “I don’t know how to lie.” He again asked: “Yes or no?” I said: “Yes.” Having heard this, he burst out laughing and said: “Can you see me in the soapbox?” I asked: “Why does he think this?” “Because, they say, the fire was visible in the window for about four days later than usual.” Then he added: “It was clear yesterday that the agreement does not at all show people’s agreement between you, and this is very good.”

Construction and finishing work proceeded at a feverish pace from January to September 1763. As a result, on the site of Peter III’s chambers, through the efforts of architects and with the unconditional personal participation of the Empress, a complex of Catherine II’s personal chambers was formed, which included the following premises: Audience Chamber with an area of ​​227 m2 , which replaced the Throne Room; Dining room with two windows; Bright office; Restroom; two casual bedrooms; Boudoir; Office and Library.

AND ABOUT. Miodushevsky. Presentation of a letter to Catherine II

All of these rooms were designed in the style of early classicism, but at the same time they combined components that are difficult to compare for this style - solemn pomp and undoubted comfort. The pomp was provided by the architects of early classicism, and comfort, without a doubt, was brought by the empress herself. However, we know about all this only from descriptions of the chambers left by contemporaries.

The direct intervention of Catherine II in the adoption of architectural decisions is known for certain. The most famous fact is the empress’s order to remodel one of her everyday bedrooms into the Diamond Room, or Diamond Room, which will be discussed later.

Contemporaries who visited the Winter Palace left numerous descriptions of the empress’s private rooms. One of these French travelers wrote: “... the empress’s apartments are very simple: in front of the audience hall there is a small glassed office where the crown and her diamonds are kept under seals; the audience hall is very simple: near the door there is a red velvet throne; then there is a living room, decorated in wood and gilt, with two fireplaces, ridiculously small. This room, used for receptions, communicates with the apartments of the Grand Duke, where there is nothing remarkable, just like in the rooms of his children.”

Let us note that marble of various grades began to arrive from the Urals to St. Petersburg to decorate the premises of the Winter Palace. Columns, fireplaces, boards for tables, etc. were hewn from this marble. Finished products and semi-finished products were delivered to St. Petersburg by water on barges. The first such transport was sent to the capital in the spring of 1766.

Empress Catherine II moved to the Winter Palace in the fall of 1763. If we look at the Chamber-Fourier journals for 1763, the chronology of events is as follows:

August 13, 1763 “Her Imperial Majesty deigned to have an outlet for a walk through the streets and deigned to be in the stone Winter Palace...”.

On October 12, 1763, the Empress ordered “the kurtag not to be, but to be on next Wednesday, that is, this October 15th in the Winter Stone Palace of Her Imperial Majesty.”

On October 15, 1763, Catherine II moved to the Winter Palace, where she held a housewarming party, “introducing” her new home to those around her.

On October 19, 1763, the Empress organized the first “public masquerade in the Winter Palace for all the nobility,” presenting the palace to all the capital's nobility.

At the same time, construction work did not stop in other parts of the palace, where the state rooms continued to be finished. It was only in 1764 that major finishing work in the Winter Palace was completed.

Naturally, with the completion of the work in 1762–1764. The Winter Palace did not remain frozen in its unchanged shape and layout. Construction work continued almost continuously on a larger or smaller scale. This is evidenced by a handwritten note by Catherine II dating back to 1766, in which she summarizes “expenses on buildings.” (See Table 1.)

Table 1

Global redevelopment of the Winter Palace began in the late 1770s. and were associated with the growth of the imperial family. All this time, construction work in the palace was led by the President of the Imperial Academy of Arts and the Empress’s secretary I.I. Betskoy. On his initiative, Catherine II signed a decree of October 9, 1769, according to which the “Office for the construction of Her Imperial Majesty’s houses and gardens” was abolished and on its basis the “Office for the construction of Her Imperial Majesty’s houses and gardens” was created under the direction of the same I. AND. Betsky. At the same time, in 1769, the Empress set a quota for the maintenance and construction of the Winter Palace at 60,000 rubles. in year.

A. Roslin. Portrait of I.I. Betsky. 1777

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