Summer Palace of Elizabeth Petrovna. Favorite residence of the three empresses Catherine's Summer Palace 2
In 1741, as a result of another palace coup, the youngest daughter of Peter I, Elizabeth, became the Russian Empress. Many contemporaries perceived the accession to the Russian throne of Elizabeth Petrovna as a guarantee of a return to the traditions of her father’s domestic and foreign policy. A new stage in the development of culture, science, and art has begun in the country.
The capital of Russia was also experiencing a new period of prosperity. The city was quickly built, new official residences, palaces, cathedrals, and theaters appeared. The reign of Elizabeth was a period of dominance in European architecture of the Baroque style, which was characterized by splendor and whimsicality of architectural forms, luxury decoration using stucco details, gilding, sculpture, and painting. At this time, the most talented architect Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli was working in St. Petersburg, and it was he who created the masterpieces of Russian Baroque, reflecting the idea of triumph and power of the country, which became one of the largest world powers.
Rastrelli received the order to build the first building for Elizabeth when she was not yet empress. The Tsesarevna ordered the construction of a Summer Palace for her on the territory of the Third Summer Garden (the modern territory bounded by Fontanka, Moika, Italianskaya Street and the Catherine Canal).
Thanks to surviving engravings and drawings, today we can imagine what Rastrelli’s creation looked like. The first floor of the palace was made of stone, the second - wooden. The palace was painted light pink, the ground floor was gray. The palace had two facades: one was facing the Nevsky prospect, the other - the main one - was facing the Moika River, towards the Summer Garden. A wide road was laid from the Nevskaya prospect along the Fontanka; greenhouses stretched along it, fruit trees grew, there was also an Elephant Yard, and its inhabitants could swim in the Fontanka in the summer.
One could enter the palace territory through a wide gate with an openwork lattice decorated with gilded eagles. In front of the main facade facing the Moika River, huge figured flower beds were built and neatly trimmed trees were planted - it turned out to be a real regular park. Rastrelli himself wrote: “The building had more than one hundred and sixty apartments, including a church, a hall and galleries. Everything was decorated with mirrors and rich sculpture, as well as a new garden, decorated with beautiful fountains...” In 1745, a covered gallery was built for the passage from the palace to the Summer Garden across the Moika.
The queen loved her luxurious Summer Palace very much. Every year at the end of April, she and the entire court moved from the Winter Palace to the Summer Palace. The move turned into a whole ceremony with orchestral music and artillery fire. At the end of September, Elizabeth returned to the Winter Palace again.
In September 1754, the future Emperor Paul I was born in the summer residence of Elizabeth. Fate decreed that it was he who, at the very beginning of his reign, demolished the dilapidated Summer Palace and ordered the construction of a castle in its place, which we know today as Mikhailovsky. And it was here that the life of Paul I tragically ended.
Text prepared by Galina Dregulas
For those who want to know more:
1. Architects of St. Petersburg. XVIII century. St. Petersburg, 1997
2. Ovsyannikov Yu. Great architects of St. Petersburg. St. Petersburg, 2000
3. Anisimov E.V. Elizaveta Petrovna. M., 2000
Summer Palace of Elizabeth Petrovna- an unpreserved imperial residence in St. Petersburg, built by B.F. Rastrelli in 1741-1744 on the site where the Mikhailovsky (Engineers) Castle is now located. Demolished in 1797
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Wooden summer palace of Elizabeth
"Tsarskoe Selo of Elizaveta Petrovna"
Winter Palace of Elizabeth Petrovna
Summer Palace of Peter I
Russian empire. Anna Ioannovna and Elizaveta Petrovna
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History of construction
Even then, the idea arose to close the alley of the Summer Garden opposite the Carpiev Pond with a palace building. This is evidenced by the project - gg., preserved in the archives. Its possible author is J.B. Leblon. It depicts a small nine-axle palace, the elevated center of which is topped with a tetrahedral dome. Wide one-story galleries cover the cour d'honneur with a lush figured parterre facing the Moika. Behind there is a garden with numerous bosquets of various shapes. Fruit plantings have been preserved on the territory of the current Mikhailovsky Garden. However, things did not go further than plans.
However, while construction was underway, a coup occurred, and Elizaveta Petrovna became the owner of the building. By the time the palace, made of wood on stone cellars, was roughly finished. The architect, in describing the buildings he created, spoke about him like this:
“This building had more than 160 apartments, including a church, a hall and galleries. Everything was decorated with mirrors and rich sculpture, as was the new garden, decorated with beautiful fountains, with the Hermitage built on the ground floor level, surrounded by rich trellises, all the decorations of which were gilded."
Despite its location within the city limits, the building is designed according to an estate plan. The plan was created under the clear influence of Versailles, which is especially noticeable from the side of the cour d'honneur: the successively narrowing spaces enhanced the effect of the baroque perspective of the courtyard, fenced off from the access road by a latticework of a magnificent design with state emblems. One-story service buildings along the perimeter of the cour d'honneur emphasize the traditional Baroque isolation of the ensemble. The rather flat decor of the light pink facades (mezzanine pilasters with Corinthian capitals and corresponding rusticated stone plinth blades, figured window frames) was offset by a rich play of volumes. Complex in plan, highly developed side wings included courtyards with small flower parterres. Lush entrance porticoes led to staircase volumes, as always with Rastrelli, offset from the central axis. From the main staircase, a series of living rooms decorated with gilded carvings led to the most representative hall of the palace - the Throne. Its two-light volume accentuated the center of the building. From the outside, curly stairs led to it, complemented by ramps on the garden side. The appearance of the palace was completed, giving it baroque splendor, by numerous statues and vases on the pediments and balustrade crowning the building. Rastrelli decorated the space up to the Moika with floral parterres with three fountain pools of complex outlines.
As often happened with the creations of an architect, over time the logical and harmonious original plan changes to suit momentary requirements. In 1744, for the Empress to go to the 2nd Summer Garden across the Moika, he built a one-story covered gallery, decorated with paintings hanging on the walls. Here, near the northwestern risalit, he creates a terrace of a hanging garden at the mezzanine level with the Hermitage pavilion and a fountain in the center of the ground floor. Along its contour it is fenced with a lush gilded trellis lattice, and multi-march gatherings in the garden are organized. Subsequently, a palace church was added to the northeastern risalit, expanding it with an additional row of rooms from the Fontanka side. Bay windows and lanterns appear on the western façade.
On the territory adjacent to the palace, a decorative park was laid out with a huge complex green labyrinth, bosquets, trellis pavilions and two trapezoidal ponds with semicircular protrusions (still preserved, they acquired free outlines during the reconstruction of the park for the Grand Duke's residence). Rastrelli reports about his work in the park in 1745:
“On the banks of the Moika in the new garden I built a large building of baths with a round salon and a fountain with several jets, with ceremonial rooms for relaxation.”
In the center of the park there were swings, slides, and carousels. The structure of the latter is unusual: rotating benches were placed around a large tree, and a gazebo was hidden in the crown, into which one climbed up a spiral staircase.
Another building located in close proximity to the north-eastern corner of the palace is associated with the name of the architect: the water supply system for the fountains of the Summer Garden, completed in the 1720s. no longer gave enough pressure, and did not correspond to the splendor and grandeur of the imperial residence. In the mid-1740s. Rastrelli builds water towers with an aqueduct across the Fontanka. Technically complex, the purely utilitarian structure made of wood was decorated with palace luxury: the wall paintings imitated lush baroque modeling.
Despite the fact that the palace was a ceremonial imperial residence, there was no direct connection with Nevskaya Prospekt: the road, which ran among unpresentable random buildings (on the banks of the Fontanka there were glaciers, greenhouses, workshops and the Elephant Yard) turned onto Italianskaya Street, and only bypassing the palace I I. Shuvalov, built by Savva Chevakinsky, crews through Malaya Sadovaya reached the central transport artery of the city. Direct communication will appear only in the next century thanks to the work of C. Rossi.
Elizaveta Petrovna loved the Summer Palace very much. At the end of April - beginning of May (weather permitting), the empress's ceremonial move from the winter residence was celebrated with a magnificent ceremony with the participation of the court, orchestra, and guard regiments accompanied by an artillery salute from the cannon at the Winter Palace and the guns of the Peter and Paul Fortress and the Admiralty. At the same time, the imperial yachts, stationed in the roadstead opposite the Apraksin House, sailed to the Summer Garden. The queen set off on her return journey at the end of September with the same ceremonies.
During the time of the first Romanov, Mikhail Fedorovich, Rubtsovo belonged to his mother, nun Marfa. After becoming Tsar, Mikhail loved to spend summer time in Pokrovskoye. In 1615, a wooden Temple in the name of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker, Mikhail erected it in gratitude for saving Moscow from the Poles and in honor of the release of his father, Patriarch Filaret, from Polish captivity. Eight years later, the wooden temple was replaced by a stone one, and a palace was built in which family celebrations were held.
IN 1619 in memory of the liberation of Moscow from the troops of the Polish prince Vladislav The stone Church of the Intercession was laid Holy Mother of God. According to the temple, the village began to be called “Pokrovskoye, Rubtsovo also”, and then simply Pokrovskoye.
Church of the Intercession in Rubtsovo.
Mikhail Fedorovich himself was involved in the arrangement of the royal estate. Nearby there were stables, kitchens, beehives, a brewery, a mill and other buildings.
The constructed wooden palace was facing the road and the Gnilushka river. IN 1632 g. it was dammed, which is why it formed Rybinsk Pond, (the remains of which were filled in in the 1920s). An orchard was laid out on the shore of the pond, where a few years later unique trees, shrubs, medicinal herbs and flowers were planted and a stone gazebo was built.
In Pokrovskoye in 1627, the eldest daughter of Mikhail Fedorovich, Grand Duchess Irina Mikhailovna, was born, in honor of whose heavenly patroness a building was built in the village Church of the Martyr Irene. It was Irina Mikhailovna who became the owner of Pokrovskoye. Her brother, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, did not particularly favor the family estate, although he regularly visited the estate, especially in spring, summer and during the hunting season.
The young Tsar Peter II also loved to hunt here. IN 1728 he came to Moscow with his young aunt Elizaveta Petrovna, and she very soon introduced him to hound and falconry hunting in the vicinity of the Mother See. With their retinue, they often went hunting to Sokolniki and stayed in the old Pokrovsky Palace. The royal hunt became the theme of the famous painting by Valentin Serov.
However, at the beginning 1730 g. Peter II died. The niece of Peter I, Anna Ioannovna, ascended the throne. Elizaveta Petrovna found herself in disgrace, was expelled from St. Petersburg to Moscow and settled in her beloved Pokrovsky Palace with her relatives Skavronsky and Gendrikov. The palace became the residence of the princess for more than ten years.
There is a legend that Elizabeth, having a naturally cheerful disposition, took part in festive round dances made up of Pokrovsk maidens. She loved to dress up in a satin sundress and kokoshnik, weave a bright ribbon into her braid and sing ditties. This is very similar to Elizabeth, who, already as empress, loved to organize metamorphosis carnivals, dressing in a man's suit to show off her slender legs.
Having ascended the throne in 1741, after the death of Anna Ioannovna, Elizabeth reigned for 20 years and all this time did not forget her beloved Pokrovsky. Already at the end of February 1741, having arrived in Moscow for the coronation, scheduled for April 25, and having barely visited the Kremlin cathedrals, Elizabeth left for Pokrovskoye, “to her winter home on the Yauza.” In the autumn of the same year, by order of Elizabeth, her nephew Duke Peter of Holstein was brought there, whom she declared as her heir to the Russian throne as her closest blood relative.
At the same time, the heir accepted the Orthodox faith and began to be called Peter Fedorovich (Peter III). In February 1744, Princess Anhalt-Zerbst arrived at the Pokrovsky Palace with her 14-year-old daughter Sophia-Augusta-Frederica, who was intended to be the bride of Peter Fedorovich. On June 28, Sophia Augusta was anointed, who received the name Ekaterina Alekseevna in Orthodoxy, and the next day she was betrothed to the heir to the throne.
Elizaveta visited Pokrovskoye from time to time and lived there for a long time, almost a year. At the site of a fire 1737 years, she built herself palace made of stone. It was a projection block with a ceremonial two-story hall and a system of enfilades intersecting at right angles. In general, the layout was typical for its time. But the rooms were decorated in “Chinese taste”; there was a lot of dishes in the palace in the same style.
In 1752, Pokrovskoye became part of the city. The condition of the estate at that time no longer satisfied the imperial court. This is how the architect Ivan Yakovlev described the palace: “In this palace, the ceilings and roof, covered with planks, fell into great disrepair; and the soap house with its chambers, due to its considerable dilapidation, must be rebuilt: and the palace will not be ordered to be re-covered with iron for strength; and in addition to all the reconstruction, will it not be ordered that something be built again?
To draw up a new project for the expansion of the palace, he was invited F.-B. Rastrelli. A the architect wanted to add another floor, raise the central part of the building and enrich the facades with Baroque decoration and semicircular ramps adjacent to the protruding central projection. However, the project to rebuild the building was not implemented, and it remained in its original form until until the second half of the nineteenth century.
But the garden in Pokrovsky was of great interest - one of the best in Moscow (planned by the same Rastrelli). Situated in the form of a rectangle with a church in the center, it is pierced by longitudinal and transverse fan-shaped alleys diverging from the oval area around the church. The basis of the garden consisted of fruit trees and shrubs. The parterres were planted with pear, apple, plum, cherry and hazel trees. Walking through them, you could enjoy yourself to your heart's content.
Already in 1760, Elizabeth undertook a search for Rastrelli’s project and inquired whether building materials had been stored in connection with it? However, that's where the matter stopped.
Project for the reconstruction of the Pokrovsky Palace. Main facade. F.-B. Rastrelli, 1752 B., pen, ink, watercolor. RGADA.
The Summer Palace of Elizabeth Petrovna is an unpreserved imperial residence in St. Petersburg, built by B. F. Rastrelli in 1741-1744 on the site where the Mikhailovsky (Engineers) Castle is now located. Demolished in 1797
History of construction
In 1712, on the southern bank of the Moika, where the pavilion of the Mikhailovsky Garden is now, a small manor house was built for Ekaterina Alekseevna, topped with a turret with a gilded spire, which bore the pretentious name “Golden Mansions”. According to him, the Big Meadow (the future Field of Mars) on the opposite bank received the name Tsaritsyn Meadow: this is what will be used most often in the 18th and early 19th centuries. The area near the palace is called the 3rd Summer Garden. On July 11, 1721, the Duke of Holstein's chamberlain Berchholz, having examined the estate, wrote down: In the queen's greenhouses, the gardener Ekliben grew fruits rare for northern latitudes: pineapples, bananas, etc. Even then, the idea arose to close the alley of the Summer Garden opposite the Carpiev Pond with a palace building. This is evidenced by the project of 1716-1717, preserved in the archives. Its possible author is J.B. Leblon. It depicts a small nine-axle palace, the elevated center of which is topped with a tetrahedral dome. Wide one-story galleries cover the cour d'honneur with a lush figured parterre facing the Moika River. Behind there is a garden with numerous bosquets of various shapes. Fruit plantings have been preserved on the territory of the current Mikhailovsky Garden. However, things did not go further than plans. Under Anna Ioannovna, the 3rd Summer Garden turns into a “jagd-garten” - a garden for “chasing and shooting deer, wild boars, hares, as well as a gallery for hunters and stone walls to prevent bullets and shot from flying in.” The “vegetable garden” was moved to Liteinaya Street, where the Mariinsky Hospital would later be built. In the early 1740s. B.F. Rastrelli began the construction of one of the most remarkable buildings of the developed Russian Baroque - the Summer Palace in the 3rd Summer Garden for the ruler Anna Leopoldovna. However, while construction was underway, a revolution occurred, and Elizaveta Petrovna became the owner of the building. By 1744, the palace, made of wood on stone cellars, was roughly completed. The architect, in describing the buildings he created, spoke about it this way: Despite the location within the city limits, the building was designed according to the estate plan. The plan was created under the obvious influence of Versailles, which is especially noticeable from the side of the cour d'honneur: the successively narrowing spaces enhanced the effect of the baroque perspective of the courtyard, fenced off from the access road by a latticework of a magnificent design with state emblems. One-story service buildings along the perimeter of the cour d'honneur emphasize the traditional Baroque isolation of the ensemble. The rather flat decor of the light pink facades (mezzanine pilasters with Corinthian capitals and corresponding rusticated stone plinth blades, figured window frames) was offset by a rich play of volumes. Complex in plan, highly developed side wings included courtyards with small flower parterres. Lush driveways...
Coordinates: 59°56′26.5″ n. w. 30°20′15.5″ E. d. / 59.940694° s. w. 30.337639° E. d.(G) (O) (I)59.940694 , 30.337639
Summer Palace of Elizabeth Petrovna- an unpreserved imperial residence in St. Petersburg, built by B. F. Rastrelli in 1741-1744 on the site where the Mikhailovsky (Engineers) Castle is now located. Demolished in 1796.
History of construction
Even then, the idea arose to close the alley of the Summer Garden opposite the Carpiev Pond with a palace building. This is evidenced by the project - gg., preserved in the archives. Its possible author is J.B. Leblon. It depicts a small nine-axle palace, the elevated center of which is topped with a tetrahedral dome. Wide one-story galleries cover the cour d'honneur with a lush figured parterre facing the Moika. Behind there is a garden with numerous bosquets of various shapes. Fruit plantings have been preserved on the territory of the current Mikhailovsky Garden. However, things did not go further than plans.
However, while construction was underway, a coup took place, and Elizaveta Petrovna became the owner of the building. By the time the palace, made of wood on stone cellars, was roughly finished. The architect, in describing the buildings he created, spoke about him like this:
“This building had more than 160 apartments, including a church, a hall and galleries. Everything was decorated with mirrors and rich sculpture, as was the new garden, decorated with beautiful fountains, with the Hermitage built on the ground floor level, surrounded by rich trellises, all the decorations of which were gilded."
Despite its location within the city limits, the building is designed according to an estate plan. The plan was created under the clear influence of Versailles, which is especially noticeable from the side of the cour d'honneur: the successively narrowing spaces enhanced the effect of the baroque perspective of the courtyard, fenced off from the access road by a latticework of a magnificent design with state emblems. One-story service buildings along the perimeter of the cour d'honneur emphasize the traditional Baroque isolation of the ensemble. The rather flat decor of the light pink facades (mezzanine pilasters with Corinthian capitals and corresponding rusticated stone plinth blades, figured window frames) was offset by a rich play of volumes. Complex in plan, highly developed side wings included courtyards with small flower parterres. Lush entrance porticoes led to staircase volumes, as always with Rastrelli, offset from the central axis. From the main staircase, a series of living rooms decorated with gilded carvings led to the most representative hall of the palace - the Throne. Its two-light volume accentuated the center of the building. From the outside, curly stairs led to it, complemented by ramps on the garden side. The appearance of the palace was completed, giving it baroque splendor, by numerous statues and vases on the pediments and balustrade crowning the building. Rastrelli decorated the space up to the Moika with floral parterres with three fountain pools of complex outlines.
As often happened with the creations of an architect, over time the logical and harmonious original plan changes to suit momentary requirements. In 1744, for the Empress to go to the 2nd Summer Garden across the Moika, he built a one-story covered gallery, decorated with paintings hanging on the walls. Here, near the northwestern risalit, he creates a terrace of a hanging garden at the mezzanine level with the Hermitage pavilion and a fountain in the center of the ground floor. Along its contour it is fenced with a lush gilded trellis lattice, and multi-march gatherings in the garden are organized. Subsequently, a palace church was added to the northeastern risalit, expanding it with an additional row of rooms from the Fontanka side. Bay windows and lanterns appear on the western façade.
On the territory adjacent to the palace, a decorative park was laid out with a huge complex green labyrinth, bosquets, trellis pavilions and two trapezoidal ponds with semicircular projections (still preserved, they acquired free outlines during the reconstruction of the park for the grand ducal residence). Rastrelli reports about his work in the park in 1745:
“On the banks of the Moika in the new garden, I built a large building of baths with a round salon and a fountain with several jets, with ceremonial rooms for relaxation.”
In the center of the park there were swings, slides, and carousels. The structure of the latter is unusual: rotating benches were placed around a large tree, and a gazebo was hidden in the crown, into which one climbed up a spiral staircase.
Another building located in close proximity to the north-eastern corner of the palace is associated with the name of the architect: the water supply system for the fountains of the Summer Garden, completed in the 1720s. no longer gave enough pressure, and did not correspond to the splendor and grandeur of the imperial residence. In the mid-1740s. Rastrelli builds water towers with an aqueduct across the Fontanka. Technically complex, the purely utilitarian structure made of wood was decorated with palace luxury: the wall paintings imitated lush baroque modeling.
Despite the fact that the palace was the ceremonial imperial residence, there was no direct connection with the Nevsky Prospect: the road, which ran among unpresentable random buildings (on the banks of the Fontanka there were glaciers, greenhouses, workshops and the Elephant Yard) turned onto Italianskaya Street, and only bypassing the palace I I. Shuvalov, built by Savva Chevakinsky, the carriages through Malaya Sadovaya reached the central transport artery of the city. Direct communication will appear only in the next century thanks to the work of C. Rossi.
Elizaveta Petrovna loved the Summer Palace very much. At the end of April - beginning of May (as the weather permitted), the empress's ceremonial move from the winter residence was formalized by a magnificent ceremony with the participation of the court, orchestra, and guard regiments accompanied by an artillery salute from the cannon at the Winter Palace and the guns of the Peter and Paul Fortress and the Admiralty. At the same time, the imperial yachts, stationed in the roadstead opposite the Apraksin House, sailed to the Summer Garden. The queen set off on her return journey at the end of September with the same ceremonies.
On September 20, the future Emperor Paul I was born within the walls of the palace. After the death of the queen, the palace is still in use: the conclusion of peace with Prussia is celebrated here. In the throne room, Catherine II receives congratulations from foreign ambassadors on the occasion of her accession to the throne. However, over time, the owner begins to give preference to other summer residences, especially Tsarskoye Selo, and the building deteriorates. First, he is given residence to G. Orlov, then to G. Potemkin. A catastrophic flood in September destroyed the fountain system of the Summer Garden. The fashion for regular parks passed, and the water cannons were not restored; the unnecessary Rastrelli aqueduct was dismantled. There are two legends of the foundation of the Mikhailovsky Castle: according to one, Paul I said: “I want to die where I was born,” according to another, a soldier standing guard in the Summer Palace, when he dozed off, saw the Archangel Michael and ordered him to tell the Tsar to build a church on this place . Be that as it may, in February, “due to dilapidation,” the Elizabethan dwelling was demolished and construction of a new imperial stronghold began. And today, only the volumetric construction of the castle’s façade facing the Summer Garden (possibly at the request of the monarch) and the magnificent drawings of M. I. Makhaev remind of the disappeared building.
