Smolny Ensemble

The Smolny Architectural Ensemble includes a number of structures put up at different times.  Founding Saint Petersburg, Peter the Great decided to make the tar yard outside the new city. This territory on the Neva bank, opposite the Nienschanz Fortress put up by the Swedes in the 17th century, was allotted for the tar-yard (Smolyanoi Dvor). Tar was stored and smelted there for the needs of the Admiralty. The name of Smolny (tar) was henceforth used for the territory, though the tar-works ceased to exist in the first half of the 18th century. In the middle of the18th century, the construction of the Smolny ensemble was started on the site. The picturesque place near the Neva curve was chosen as the location for the mansion, known as the Smolny palace. It was the place where the daughter of Peter the Great, Elizabeth, who ascended the Russian throne in 1741, lived. Although Elizabeth is known as the Merry Queen, she wanted to become a nun at the end of her life. She ordered the court architect Rastrelli to build a nunnery on the place of the former tar yard.  Elizabeth died before the nunnery was finished, and the buildings never came to be a nunnery and was used as the widows' house. In 1764, Catherine the Great founded in the buildings the school for noble-birth girls, which was called the Smolny Institute. It was the first school for women in Russia and the first secular school for women in Europe. It was famous for its traditions and brilliant education that was given to its alumnus. Later the Smolny Convent was turned into the boarding school for girls from middle-class families. The landmark of the Smolny Ensemble is the Smolny Cathedral, designed by architect Rastrelli. He managed to combine elements of Russian and European architecture perfectly and harmonically. The cathedral with the corner churches and the buildings of the convent is one of the most picturesque architectural ensembles of Saint Petersburg. Rastrelli didn't get to see his work completed, as in the second half of the 18th century the construction of the ensemble was interrupted and recommenced only in the first half of the 19th century. Architect Stasov was responsible for the cathedral interior decoration. He also made the sketches for the cathedral railing, which ranges among the most beautiful railings of Saint Petersburg - the railings of the Summer Garden and the Cathedral of Our Lady of Kazan. The Smolny Cathedral was consecrated in 1835 as the cathedral of all the Russian education schools for the sake of Christ's Resurrection.  The Smolny cathedral is the record breaker of the construction terms, as the building has the longest story of erection in the city. The construction works were started in 1748, and the interior decorations were finished only in 1835. Thus, it took 87 years to build the cathedral.  Not all the plans of Rastrelli were fulfilled in the composition of the Smolny Ensemble. According to the architect's project, the ensemble was supposed to be decorated with many-tier belfry 140 meters high. The belfry was intended to be the tallest in Russia.  To the south of the Smolny Convent the Smolny Boarding School for Young Ladies of Noble Birth was erected in 1806-1808; it was designed in Russian Empire style by architect Quarenghi. The classicism style building is oriented on the Neva River. Its central part is decorated with grand eight-columned portico with a fronton. As the majority of Quarenghi's works, the Smolny Institute features perfect proportions, solemnity and grandeur, emphasized by two pavilions-porticos and the central alley of the garden, leading to the main entrance to the building. The interior of the Smolny institute features austerity and rationality. The gala hall in the south wing of the building is one of the best surviving interiors by Quarenghi. In 1917, the buildings of the Smolny Ensemble became the revolutionary headquarters. It was here that Lenin, the leader of the Bolsheviks Party, resided during the October upheaval, when the Provisional Government was arrested and the Social Revolution won.  Nowadays the Smolny Cathedral is used as a concert and exhibition hall and the Smolny Institute and former nunnery are occupied by the State University of Saint Petersburg and city administration.