Scholarly record

THE CLASSICAL MODELS BROUGHT BY EUROPEAN ARCHITECTS TO THE DEVELOPMENT OF ST PETERSBURG AND THE RECONSTRUCTION OF MOSCOW AFTER THE GREAT FIRE OF 1812

D. Shvidkovsky, G. Yesoulov

Abstract

The paper determines features of the Empire style in Russia before and after the Great fire of Moscow of 1812 during the war with Napoleon I. The Russian Empire style has generally three branches: Moscow, St Petersburg and provincial one with their specific features. The Imperial power established an elaborated system of model designs (more then a 1000 made by a team of architects of different nationalities) for a detailed typology of civil, military and private buildings and town planning elements made by the decree of Alexander I part of the Civil Codex of the Empire. The specific position Moscow Empire style after 1812, was produced mostly by the architects from Techno and Scotland, especially in the counter position of Antiquity and Modernity. The great number of the Empire style buildings Moscow, arising from the necessity of a total reconstruction of the city after the fire of 1812. Out of 9,000 buildings standing in Moscow on the eve of Napoleon’s invasion, 6,500 were destroyed during the occupation. During the rebuilding of Moscow the Empire style underwent substantial change, diverging both from its original French models and from the forms it had taken from St Petersburg Palladian taste linked to those models, which were elaborated for the whole Empire by mostly two architects: William Hastie from Scotland, who new the Charles’s Craig and William Plaifaire’s ideas for the New town of Edinburgh and a Lombardian Luigi Rusca, acquainted with Napoleonic planning activities in Milan. The stylistic unity of major public buildings and churches raised between 1813 and 1830 was produced by masters like Josef Bove, the clan of Gilardi from Tecin?. By opposing glory of medieval monuments and triumphal classical forms of mayor Empire style buildings and uniformed dwelling houses Moscow architecture got its character after the Napoleonic wars. In spite of this the triumphant image of the Empire style St Petersburg was based on Anglo Italian Palladian tradition as it had been interpreted by the Russian architectural “world” including important clients and “dilettanti” from the Imperial court.

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