By EDF Academic Member in Spain, Antonio Perez Caballero
“QUAND on veut décrire la vie où l’on s’amuse, au fond, semble-t-il aux autres, la vie des fous : mais c’est la vie des gens qui ont la liberté du monde entier ; la liberté du grand luxe, ou, étant vraiment heureux, on peut se moquer de tout. Bref, de mon point de vue, c’est ce que représente vraiment le mot “liberté”
From the memoirs of Nadine Wonlar-Larsky, née Nabokova, “The Russia That I Loved”, who spent her happiest days in Russia in the Nabokov mansion located next to the Demidov mansion.
In a city renowned by the otherworldly luxury of her private residences and architectural sophistication, the palace on number 43 of the Bolshaya Morskaya truly stands out for the Italianate early baroque stone and marble facade. One of the most prestigious addresses in the capital, the quiet residential street boasted the Fabergé atelier and residence and, neighbouring it, we would find the mansions of Polovtsov, Nabokov and, directly across the Moika Canal, the Yusupov. To stand out in that street was not easy but the house is certainly impressive and, in style, rather unique, quite like a Roman Palazzo transported from Northen Venice stone-by-stone.
The porte cochère in the center was on both sides presided by couples of beautifully sculpted atlas and caryatids, with small sources of water falling into marble bowls from seashells. Later the northern winter weather made it impossible to maintain the water pieces and they were left as decoration. The powerful figures support a wide balcony, also in marble, with the central french window crowned by the coat of arms of the family. The man behind the design was none other than August de Montferrand, the architect responsible, amongst many other buildings, the nearby St. Isaac Cathedral and the Lobanov-Rostovsky enormous palace that organised esthetically that entire area of the city center.
The choice was only natural, not only because of his talent, but also because the Montferrand family had worked already for the Demidovs, as agents for Nicholas Nikitich (1773-1828), father of Pavel Nicholaevich (1798-1840). So much so that they attended the very wedding ceremony of Pavel Nicholaevich with one of the most beautiful ladies of the Imperial Court, demoiselle d’honneur of the Empress and daughter of the Viborg governor, the celebrated, Aurora Sjernval von Wallen. On the 14th of February 1836, in anticipation of the wedding, Pavel Nicholaevich bought the mansion and barely eleven days later he added the neighbouring number 45 house. Money most positively was not a problem. Other noble families like the Yusupovs or Stroganovs have been known for their enormous wealth, but the Demidovs had nothing to envy those neighbours. Famous for their prospecting in their many Ural mines, owners of immense country states, palaces and buildings all over Russia, their wealth was literally endless. But the Demidovs did not only use their wealth for their own pleasure, as did so many other aristocrats, they also were philanthropists who spent huge sums on the improvement of the life of the many ordinary Russian people. From schools to hospitals to annual prizes to enable students to travel around Europe for months and, of course, to launch their professional careers, and once more under the generous patronage of the Demidovs.
Amongst the designers that created the sumptuous interiors of Paul’s mansion was Garald Andreevich Bosse (1812-1894), expert in the charming rococo revival of the period and A. Viggi, celebrated by his exquisite paintings on faux marbre in several palaces. The plot of land, though by no means small, was nonetheless densely built around two courts, the first larger one and the second narrower one, destined to be the servant quarters. It had to be so, to accommodate the immense Parade Halls that the family would need to entertain in the scale that befitted their status. And truly they made the most of the mansion, a wide stately hall of white marble and an imperial staircase led visitors to the most famous hall in the house: The Malachite Hall. In Louis XV style, the long gallery occupied the central five windows of the facade’s bel stage. The room boasted pairs of columns at each side of the central mantelpiece, all of which were done in malachite. This was unheard of and the first time such precious stones were used in such architectural elements. This would later become the model for Montferrand’s iconostasis in St. Isaac Cathedral and, most universally renowned, the Malachite Hall in the Winter Palace. The Banqueting Hall, opposite the Parade Court, was no less impressive, done in an elegant Empire Style, a thick carpet covered the marquetry parquets, while the ceiling, rich in ornamental painting, had impressive vaults framing classical semicircular windows reflected onto the looking glasses and upper walled windows, certainly another regal hall. The Drawing room, with niches and columns at each end, followed the scale and luxury of the previous rooms, rare woods enriching the floor while, throughout the entire mansion, the Demidovs made use of their own Ural mines as the source of the marble and other precious minerals. It simply was the most opulent mansion of the street, which is quite a lot to say.
The only heir of Pavel Nicholaevich and Aurora Karlovna, Pavel Pavlovich Demidov (1839-1885), leased the mansion in 1864 for nine years and for 10.000 rubles in each of the years to the Italian Embassy. Rumour had it that he gambled considerably, to the point of needing to sell the mansion in 1875. The years and the owner passed and the second encounter with the Italian Embassy came when the mansion was bought by the Italian state in 1911. This would eventually prove to have catastrophic consequences for the building. At the beginning of the First World War, the edifice stood empty, until the time of 1924, when the government, now under Mussolini, resumed diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union. As part of this process, Italy recovered possession of the mansion where it remained as the Italian embassy until 1957. It then became an Italian consulate office after Moscow was declared the capital of the new Soviet Union. As soon as 1925, the consulate received orders to transport to Italy everything that had of “some value” in the mansion. The report of the Consular General to the Soviet authorities, who were granting them a free plot of land in Moscow, was as follows: Italian embassy in Leningrad. “Sent: 4 columns, 4 corner pilasters, 12 ordinary pilasters. Marble fireplace with malachite and bronze trim and black marble base.” The list is dated 13 June 1925 and is signed by the Royal Consulate General.
The truth is even worse as they did not stop with dismembering and transporting the malachite and structural elements of the decoration, but also the precious marquetry floors, sconces and literally everything that could pulled off the walls, so stucco decoration, etc. In the end, the result was a wanton destruction of a monument of the highest significance. Of course the Glavnauka branch of the then Leningrad city asked for the prohibition of this kind of export and asked the People’s Commissariat to prevent the shameful exploitation but to no avail. Whatever the motive and whomever was ultimately responsible the contents were shipped out of Russia through the Crimea. Ironically, during the shipping process everything was irretrievably lost or destroyed. A sad, ghastly end for such a magnificent mansion, the first malachite hall in the world, a symbol of the Demidov Dynasty with its unlimited riches, and a masterpiece of the interior decoration in Russian history. Sadly, though, in those interwar years between 1918 and 1941 there would be thousands of such sales and thousands of “lost” pieces of the country’s artistic heritage never to be seen again.
