VirtuosoLife - January/February 2008 - (Page 50) DESIGN TOUR Russian Princess Saint Petersburg’s finer points shine in winter. AINT PeTerSburg rAvISheS the eye. Palatial baroque and classical facades in ice cream colors – pistachio, cassis, raspberry, and mango – shimmer in the watery northern light and are reflected in a network of canals. vast squares and arrow-straight boulevards Serge Bogomyako/alamy S BY MICHAEL WEBB evoke the immensity of russia, but Saint Petersburg was designed by Italian architects to supplant Moscow and turn the nation toward europe. Peter the great, a visionary tyrant, commanded the city to rise from marshes, and his successors enriched it. renamed Petrograd in 1914 and then Lenigrad, following the bolshevik coup of 1917, the city and its people were brutalized by Stalin and by the 900-day Nazi siege. but Saint Petersburg is a phoenix that has reclaimed Snow queen: Catherine Palace presides over a wintry day in Tsarskoe Selo. 50 V I RT U O S O L I F E
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