St. Petersburg -- Pushkin

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May 22nd 2010

Published: May 22nd 2010

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charuavi

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Catherine’s Palace at Tsarkoye Selo and Pavlovsk at Pushkin

The suburban Imperial Estates of St. Petersburg like Catherine’s Palace, Pavlovsk, Gatchina etc. are marvels of recreation.

Please note that I am not using the word ‘restoration’ since after the ‘Siege of Leningrad’ in WWII, there was nothing left to restore in those palaces. They were totally looted and ravaged, though some of the art treasures were moved to the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg in the nick of the time and thus escaped the looting.

So, what we see now at the Catherine’s Palace and Pavlovsk is a ‘recreation’ of those palaces, faithful to the original, and that is why the palaces look brand-new, not ‘lived-in’, and the artifacts look fresh.

Catherine’s Palace was particularly famous for its ‘Amber Room’. The original panels are lost irrevocably, but the new ones are equally beautiful and impressive.

However, no photography is allowed in the Amber Room, so I cannot upload any photos of it. Good in a way, because the photos cannot do justice to its brilliance.

Here is a photo-blog of Catherine’s Palace at Tsarkoye Selo and the Pavlovsk Palace at Pushkin.

Additional photos below

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