St Petersburg Private tour, Classical Hermitage

Interior visits: WINTER PALACE • This former royal residence, built by the architect Rastrelli in 1764, still represents a brilliant example of Baroque style. Beautifully decorated outside, it keeps even more opulence inside: marble staircases and ceiling paintings, bronze chandeliers and lacy parquet floors, sculptures and decorative art works. • Highlights: staterooms, which witnessed the bloom and the fall of the Russian Empire; works by Vouet, Lorrain, Pussain, Le Nain, Fragonard, Gainsborough
SMALL HERMITAGE • The extension of the Winter Palace and the starting point of the museum. Built in 1772 by the order of Empress Catherine II – the true lover of art – it became a private storage of paintings and applied art of her own collection. The main hall, facing a cute inner garden, looks like a wedding cake with its crystal chandeliers, marble curles and flowers! • Highlights: the Peacock Clock, mosaics, applied art of Medieval Europe
OLD HERMITAGE • The extension of the Winter Palace built by the order of Empress Catherine II in 1787 • Highlights: works by Leonardo da Vinci, Tizian, Rafael, Giorgone, Michelangelo
NEW HermitageThe extension of the Winter Palace deliberately constructed as a public gallery. Designed in 1852 in the way of an ancient Greek temple (with a reference to the Temple of Arts), its spacious and stylish skylight interiors do encourage everyone to explore canvases and statues on display! • Highlights: works by Canaletto, Caravaggio, Tintoretto, Canova, Velasquez, El Greco, Rubens, Rembrandt, van Dyck, little Dutch masters; sculpture of Ancient Greece and Rome.