The Petersburg urban estate arose in Petrine time, developed throughout the eighteenth century and finally turned into a distinctive architectural and cultural phenomenon during the latter half of the nineteenth century. These four buildings{u2014} that of the Counts Bobrinskii, the estate palaces of Duchess Xenia Aleksandrovna and Grand Duke Aleksei Aleksandrovich, and the later estate of Dutch consul G. G. van der Pals{u2014}provide examples of a distinct branch of Russian architecture: the urban estate. Adapting the usual space of parks and gardens to the dimensions of a city, the architects and those who commissioned their works (usually members of the imperial family and their court) created the illusion of a country house by deep yards, tall fences, and high walls separating the property from the city around it.

The earliest of those published in this book, the estate of Count Bobrinskii, the illegitimate son of Catherine the Great and Grigorii Orlov, illustrates an exemplary neoclassical style and was designed in the 1790s by L. Ruska on the foundation of an earlier building. The estates of Grand Duke Alexander Alexandrovich and Grand Duchess Ksenia Alexandrovno show the historicism of the mid nineteenth century as shaped by Mesmakher and Monighetti. The fourth estate dates to the late nineteenth century and displays an eclectic style and characteristics of early art nouveau. The author discusses both architectural history and the lives of the residents. Recent and archival photos of interiors are rare visual records of buildings that have been in oblivion since the imperial period. The book includes historical and iconographic material enabling the reader to sense the special charm of the Petersburg urban estate.

There is a list of major archival sources such as the Russian State Historical Archives, the Central State Historical Archives of St. Petersburg, the Photoarchive of the Institute of Material Culture, to name but three, and also a list of relevant literature. -- Summary written by John W. Emerich, Bronze Horseman Literary Agency.