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Video: Dance lessons for Sasha Pushkin and circles for young pioneers: What the Winter Palace in Miniature went through
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
It is called a "chest of drawers" and "Miniature Winter Palace". This building is actually the only "representative" of the Rastrelli Baroque architectural style in the center of Moscow. And it so happened that this very house keeps in itself the memory of many great people of Russia. At different times and for different reasons, Pushkin, Stanislavsky, Mendeleev and other famous personalities appeared in it.
Rastrelli's trail?
The building, located on Pokrov Street, was built in the 18th century by order of Count Matvey Apraksin. Interestingly, there is no exact information about its architect - there are only a number of assumptions. Since the building is very reminiscent of Rastrelli's works in St. Petersburg and especially the famous Winter Palace, its authorship is attributed to someone who worked in this particular style. For example, it could be one of the students of the great architect or Rastrelli himself.
There is also a version that Dmitry Ukhtomsky could have designed the house, who during the reign of Elizabeth was the chief architect of Moscow and presented the capital with many beautiful buildings. By the way, he signed the plan of the courtyard with future buildings on this land plot on Pokrovka.
Massive platbands and stucco moldings, large columns, curved shapes, rounded corners, a magnificently decorated front part, wings connected to the main building with arches and passages - all this looks very Petersburg-style. The curved lines of the façade alternate with flat and convex surfaces.
The building is distinguished by an abundance of baroque elements and rich décor. In general, from an architectural point of view, this is a real mini-palace.
New owners
Six years after the construction, in 1772, Apraksin sold the estate to Prince Dmitry Trubetskoy, the great-grandfather of Leo Tolstoy. By this time, the fashion for such a style of buildings began to fade away, and the townspeople began to jokingly call this unusual mansion a "chest of drawers". And the truth: if you look at it from the side, then it is somewhat reminiscent of a huge old chest of drawers. This nickname could also be connected with the fact that Trubetskoy added a second floor to the outbuildings located on the sides, and built another building on the far border of his huge plot, in which a stable was located. Thus, a closed courtyard was created.
Well, the inhabitants of the estate and their descendants, in other words, the entire younger branch of this famous family, were nicknamed "Trubetskoy-Komod" by their contemporaries.
Who has never been here
It is worth mentioning separately about famous people and the events connected with them, the memory of which is kept in the Moscow "Winter Palace in Miniature".
Firstly, in this house, Count Nikolai Tolstoy made an offer to Princess Maria Volkonskaya. As you know, the great writer Leo Tolstoy was subsequently born in this marriage.
Secondly, when the Trubetskoys left for their estate near Moscow for a long time, they rented their "chest of drawers" to lodgers, and during 1849-50 Dmitry Mendeleev lived in their house.
And also, according to the recollections of the sister of Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin, as a child, she and her brother were taken to the Trubetskoy estate for dancing classes. And even in adulthood, the great poet visited this house more than once to visit the Trubetskoys.
In 1861, the widow of Yuri Trubetskoy, the last owner, sold the building. Since then, a men's gymnasium began to work in the dresser-house. And this period is again associated with a number of historical figures. At different times, the physicist and founder of aerodynamics N. Zhukovsky, the philosopher V. Soloviev, the legendary director K. Stanislavsky, the writer A. Remizov and other great people studied at the gymnasium.
Soviet years
The gymnasium worked within these walls until 1917. After the revolution, the Bolsheviks closed the educational institution as unnecessary, and the house church, which was located in one of the premises of the gymnasium, was destroyed. The entire building was given over to communal apartments. The new tenants were not particularly worried about the history of the mansion, and most likely they did not even think about the fact that its interior and exterior decoration is of architectural value. Even if they did know, they would hardly stand on ceremony with the "remnants of the bourgeoisie" in conditions of devastation and the struggle against old values.
During the Civil War, residents of communal apartments in a chest of drawers actively dismantled parquet floors, stair railings, furniture, tore decorative wooden elements from the walls in the rooms and heated the stoves with them. And when everything that could be used as firewood was burned, doors were also used.
However, communal apartments did not last long here, and the building again became uninhabited. During the years of socialism, it was transferred to various organizations. For example, at one time the district Palace of Pioneers and the Research Institute of Geophysics were located here. Now the building houses several organizations.
And this is how they look abandoned villas and mansions in different parts of the world, in which life once was in full swing.
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