By LITTLE RUSSIA IN US
The inimitable beauty of St. Peterburg architectural ensembles and squares was extolled by many poets. The city dates its existence from May 16 (27, New Style), 1703, when the corner-stone of the Peter and Paul Fortress was laid. The city grew rapidly in accordance with a well thought-out plan. Its unique architectural monuments were created by the genius of such eminent Russian architects as Mikhail Zemtsov, Ivan Korobov and Piotr Yeropkin, and also by Western European masters - Domenico Trezzini, Bartolommeo Francesco Rastrelli, Alexandre Jean-Baptiste Le Blond, and others. The early eighteeth-century architectural ensembles were mainly constructed in the style known as the Petrine Baroque. The small buildings of the period are characterized by laconic architectural forms and festive colourfulness. In St. Petersburg the Baroque style found its fullest expression in Rastrelli's work. His Winter and Stroganov Palaces and the Smolny Convent are elegant and full of grandeur. The eighteenth-century architecture greatly influenced the shaping of the city appearence. Some of the buildings of the time are real masterpieces of world architecture.
E. Kalnitskaya.
The Kunstkammer. 1718-1734. Architects Mikhail Zemtsov, Gaetano
Chiaveri, Georg Johann Mattarnovi, Nicolaus Herbel.
The Menshikov Palace 1710. Architects Giovanni Mario Fontana, Gottfried
Shadel
The Cathedral of the Smolny Convent 1748-1764. Architect Bartolommeo
Rastrelli.
The
Sheremetiev Palace 1730-1755. Architects Feodor Argunov and Savva
Chevakinsky.
The Cathedral of Sts Peter and Paul 1712-1732. Architect Domenico
Trezzini.
The Kikin Mansion 1714-1720
The Winter Palace 1754-1762. Architect Bartolommeo Rastrelli.
The St. Nicholas Cathedral 1753-62. Architect Savva Chevakinsky. On the
right - view of the Kryukov Canal and the bell-tower of the St. Nicholas
Cathedral.
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