Now Playing: Language: Russian. Duration: 12 minutes, 48 seconds.
Topic: Alexander Palace
For those of you who have never had the opportunity of visiting the Alexander Palace, I am pleased to present the following video created by Polzovtelya Channel of St. Petersburg.
The video will take you through the Alexander Palace providing a glimpse of all the rooms currently open to the public, including the recently restored State Rooms.
Please keep in mind that many of the historical interiors of the Alexander Palace were destroyed during the Second World War. The Soviets chose not to reconstruct them when they restored the palace after the war. The rooms in which the historical interiors have not been preserved are highlighted by enormous photographs on the walls of these rooms showing how each room looked before the Revolution. As part of an exhaustive restoration plan, six of these rooms, including the Maple, Pallisander and Mauve rooms will be restored to their historical originals over the next four years. These rooms are scheduled to be open to the public by 2016.
Also, many pieces of furniture on view in the rooms are original. Others are reproductions which have been carefully recreated from vintage photographs and drawings in the palace archives. They were made specially for a Russian film about the lives of Nicholas and Alexandra some years back in which a number of scenes were shot on location at the Alexander Palace. It is also interesting to note that a considerable number of items from the Alexander Palace (an estimated 5,615 items) are currently on display or in storage at Pavlovsk. They had been moved there in 1957, after the Alexander Palace had been taken over by the military six years prior.
In August 1997, I offered a unique tour to Russia, The World of Nicholas and Alexandra. It was during this tour that I was given the honour of offering the first visit by a group to the Alexander Palace. Since then, I have returned many times and I am so pleased to see the palace coming back to life as the last home of Emperor Nicholas II and his family.
© Paul Gilbert @ Royal Russia. 05 May, 2012
Updated: Saturday, 5 May 2012 11:21 AM EDT
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