Nevsky Prospect 86 is a neoclassical palace situated on the

Nevsky Prospect Nevsky Prospect ( rus, Не́вский проспе́кт, r=Nevsky Prospekt, p=ˈnʲɛfskʲɪj prɐˈspʲɛkt) is a main street ( high street) located in the federal city of St. Petersburg in Russia. Its name comes from the Alexander Nevs ...

in St Petersburg, Russia. It is also known as the Palace of Arts or the Palace of Zinaida Yusupova. The first palace on the site of the present palace was built in the middle of the 18th century, shortly after the founding of St Petersburg, by Prince Troubetzkoy. In the 1780s, his son, rebuilt and enlarged the original wooden structure in stone. At the end of the 18th century, the palace passed to the diplomat Prince Kurakin; it again changed hands during the first quarter of the 19th century, when it was sold to Colonel Fyodor Petrov-Solovovo. The new owner had the palace again rebuilt under the direction of the architect Mikhail Ovsyannikov. He created the neoclassical five columned centrepiece of the principal facade which is the

corps de logis In architecture, a ''corps de logis'' () is the principal or main block, or central building of a mansion, country or manor house, castle, or palace. It contains the rooms of principal business, the state apartments and the ceremonial or formal ...

of the palace today. The same architect further extended rear the building between 1829 and 1832. In 1835, the building had another new owner, Count Vladislav Branitsky; he employed the Swiss architect

Gaspare Fossati The Fossati brothers, Gaspare (7 October 1809 – 5 September 1883) and Giuseppe (1822–1891), were Swiss architects. They completed more than 50 projects in Turkey (then the Ottoman Empire) during the Tanzimat era. They belonged to the Morcot ...

to remodel and extend the palace. It was this architect who is responsible for the distinctive facade facing the Nevsky Prospect today. This facade is of nineteen bays, the central five bays are slightly projecting with

Doric columns The Doric order is one of the three orders of ancient Greek and later Roman architecture; the other two canonical orders were the Ionic and the Corinthian. The Doric is most easily recognized by the simple circular capitals at the top of t ...

. Additionally, the facade is terminated at each end by slightly recessed bays containing a high segmented portal with a segmented window designed to be a pastiche of a Venetian window. The principal entrance is on the ground floor at the centre of the facade. The palace comprises four floors, the two lowest, secondary floors, are a semi-basement and a

mezzanine A mezzanine (; or in Italian, a ''mezzanino'') is an intermediate floor in a building which is partly open to the double-height ceilinged floor below, or which does not extend over the whole floorspace of the building, a loft with non-sloped ...

; both these floors form a rustic base to the two principal floors above. The third floor is a

piano nobile ( Italian for "noble floor" or "noble level", also sometimes referred to by the corresponding French term, ) is the architectural term for the principal floor of a '' palazzo''. This floor contains the main reception and bedrooms of the house ...

and has tall casement windows; the fourth floor only has windows in the five central bays, the flanking seven bay wings at fourth floor level are adorned with heavy armorial bass relief panels. The central columned five bays are surmounted by a pediment, which once displayed the Branitsky arms, the coat of arms was defaced after the Russian Revolution, but the sculpted decoration which supported the arms remains. Branitsky sold the palace to a member of the Kalugin family, who then resold it to

Dmitry Bernadaki Dmitry (); Church Slavic form: Dimitry or Dimitri (); ancient Russian forms: D'mitriy or Dmitr ( or ) is a male given name common in Orthodoxy, Orthodox Christian culture, the Russian version of Demetrios (, ). The meaning of the name is "devote ...

. Between the beginning of the 20th century and 1917 the palace belonged to Princess

Zinaida Yusupova Princess Zinaida Nikolaevna Yusupova (; 2 September 1861 – 24 November 1939) was a Russian noblewoman, the only heiress of Russia's largest private fortune of her time. Famed for her beauty, the lavishness of her hospitality, and her extensi ...

, though she probably never lived there, as she is known to have lived in her larger St Petersburg residence, the

Moika Palace The Palace of the Yusupovs on the Moika (), known as the Moika Palace or Yusupov Palace, is a former residence of the Russian noble House of Yusupov in St. Petersburg, Russia, now a museum. The building was the site of Grigori Rasputin's murder ...

. In 1917, after the Russian Revolution, the building was nationalized. The building is listed as a cultural monument of federal significance (as either Petrovo-Solovovo House or Zinaida Yusupova House). It is also a part (together with the whole ensemble of Nevsky Prospect) of the World Heritage site

Historic Centre of Saint Petersburg and Related Groups of Monuments The Historic Centre of Saint Petersburg and Related Groups of Monuments is the name used by UNESCO when it collectively designated the historic core of the Russian city of St. Petersburg, as well as buildings and ensembles located in the immediat ...

References

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