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Walking routes in Saint Petersburg

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      Smolny and Tauride Garden at night

      ⏱ 3 h🚶 3 km🍽 1📍 6 stops
      🐢 A little — under 3 km

      Rastrelli's blue cathedral lit up, the Petrine Kikin Chambers and the quiet evening Tauride Garden, and at the end — an art café on Furshtatskaya with live music every evening.

      🌙 Evening🏛 History and architecture🌳 Parks and nature
      🗺 Open in Yandex Maps
      1. 1
        🏛 Smolny Institute
        Смольный пр., 1
        Quarenghi's Neoclassicism: the former institute for noble maidens, the headquarters of the 1917 revolution, now the governor's administration; from the square you can see the propylaea and the garden with the Lenin monument, and the museum is by prior reservation.
        Get there by 17:30 — from Chernyshevskaya it is 25 minutes along Shpalernaya, or by bus. The propylaea and Quarenghi's facade look good at dusk, when the lamps of the square are lit.
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Smolny Institute
        © Kora27 · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • The Smolny Institute is Russia's first educational institution for women, conceived on the model of the Saint-Cyr institute near Paris.
        • Girls were admitted from the age of six for 12 years, and parents signed a pledge not to take their daughter home before the term was up.
        • The pupils' uniform changed colour with age: coffee-brown, dark blue, light blue, and white for the oldest.
        • Quarenghi built the building with its eight-column portico in 1806–1808.
        • On 1 December 1934 Sergei Kirov, head of the Leningrad Communists, was assassinated at Smolny.
        • Since 1996 Smolny has been the official residence of the governor of Petersburg.
      2. 🚶 on foot
      3. 2
        🌅 Smolny Cathedral (bell tower)
        пл. Растрелли, 1
        🎟 partly ticketed · The climb to the bell tower is ticketed
        A viewing platform on the bell tower — 277 steps
        The most striking moment is when the cathedral is already lit and the sky is still blue. The bell tower climb is by ticket and not every evening, so we look from outside, from Rastrelli Square.
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Smolny Cathedral (bell tower)
        © Никонико962 · CC BY-SA 4.0
        Smolny Cathedral (bell tower)
        © A.Savin · CC BY-SA 3.0
        • The cathedral was founded on 30 October 1748: Elizabeth Petrovna wanted to end her days in a convent on the site of the palace of her childhood.
        • Because of the Seven Years' War money ran out, and under Elizabeth Rastrelli's cathedral was left unfinished as a bare shell.
        • The cathedral was completed by Vasily Stasov and consecrated on 20 July 1835.
        • Rastrelli built the cathedral ‘cold’, and Stasov had to struggle to cut flues for stoves in the walls.
        • The cathedral is 93.7 metres high.
        • The giant bell tower Rastrelli had planned was raised only a few metres and then dismantled.
        • From 1990 to 2015 the cathedral served as a classical music concert hall.
      4. 🚶 on foot
      5. 3
        🏛 Kikin Hall
        Ставропольская ул., 9
        One of the oldest buildings in the city (1714): the chambers of the boyar Kikin, executed in the case of Tsarevich Alexei; under Peter they housed the first library and the Kunstkamera. Now a music school — view from the outside.
        The Petrine chambers of 1714 on Stavropolskaya — one of the oldest buildings in the city, we look from outside.
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Kikin Hall
        © Ludvig14 · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • The layout and dimensions of the chambers match the central part of the Grand Peterhof Palace; the architect is thought to be Andreas Schlüter.
        • In 1719–1727 the Kunstkamera collections and Peter the Great's personal library were kept here.
        • From 1733 the building held an infirmary and the chancellery of the Horse Regiment; Rastrelli put a wooden bell tower over the house church.
        • The chambers were badly damaged in the Siege; in 1952–1956 they were restored to their 1719–1720 appearance to a design by Irina Benois.
        • Today a music lyceum works in the building.
      6. 🚶 on foot
      7. 4
        🏛 Tauride Palace
        Шпалерная ул., 47
        🎟 ticket · tours by reservation only, with a passport
        Potemkin's palace by Starov (1780s): the State Duma met here, and today it houses the CIS Inter-Parliamentary Assembly; inside only on tours by reservation, while the classical façade with its dome is visible from Shpalernaya.
        A classical facade with a dome — from Shpalernaya; inside only on tours by appointment.
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Tauride Palace
        © VekaSpb · CC BY-SA 4.0
        Tauride Palace
        © Godot13 · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • The palace is named after the title "Tauride" that Potemkin received in 1787 for annexing Crimea.
        • About 400,000 roubles in gold were spent on its construction and decoration.
        • In spring 1791 Potemkin threw a lavish feast here, hoping to win back Catherine II's favour.
        • In 1797 Paul I gave the palace to the Horse Guards as barracks and had its furnishings carted off to the Mikhailovsky Castle.
        • In 1906–1910 the interiors were remodelled for the State Duma, and on 5 (18) January 1918 the Constituent Assembly met here.
        • Today the palace is the headquarters of the CIS Inter-Parliamentary Assembly.
      8. 🚶 on foot
      9. 5
        🌳 Tauride Garden
        🚪 entrance on the Shpalernaya Street side
        A large landscape garden by the Tauride Palace with canals, hills and playgrounds.
        The garden is open until midnight: in the evening, ponds, little bridges and lamps along the paths, few people. Leave onto Kirochnaya or Tavricheskaya and on to Furshtatskaya.
        🚪 exit to Kirochnaya Street
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Tauride Garden
        © Anzhi86 · CC0
        Tauride Garden
        © Liabilityme · CC BY-SA 4.0
        Tauride Garden
        © Godot13 · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • The garden was laid out in 1783–1800 by the English gardener William Gould at Prince Potemkin's Tauride Palace.
        • The ponds were filled with water from the Ligovsky Canal and stocked with sterlet, and the soil dug out was piled into hills.
        • The garden opened to the public only in 1866.
        • From 1958 it was the City Children's Park; the historic name was restored in 1975.
        • In Chukovsky's “Moydodyr”, it is in the Tauride Garden that the washcloth chases the hero and he meets the Crocodile.
        • The garden has monuments to Tchaikovsky (1990) and Yesenin (1995).
      10. 🚶 on foot
      11. 6
        🍽 Sunduk art café
        Фурштатская ул., 42
        ▮▮▯▯▯
        Dinner with live music: it plays every evening from 20:30, free. The café is open until 23:00, Wednesday to Saturday until 23:30.
        🍴 An art café by the Tauride Garden with a kitsch interior built up over thirty years: stained glass, paintings, porcelain. Live music every evening from 20:30, no cover charge. Russian and European food, average bill about 1,500 ₽.
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        • Sunduk's interior took shape over about 30 years; artists and stained-glass masters worked on it, including Alexander Gerasimov and Yury Manelis.
        • The decor is deliberately kitsch: paintings, porcelain figurines, plaster busts and bright clashing colours.
        • The café has three small rooms, seating 16, 25 and 24 guests.
        • There is a music programme every evening.
        • The Tauride Garden and the Wedding Palace on Furshtatskaya are next door, so it is a handy place to celebrate.

      ↩️ Getting back: to Chernyshevskaya metro — 7 minutes on foot along Furshtatskaya

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