The Summer Garden

The Summer Garden is the oldest of Saint Petersburg's formal parks, laid out by decree of Peter the Great in 1704 as a summer imperial residence. The garden occupies its own island, bounded by the Neva, the Fontanka, the Moika and the Lebyazhya Canal. Work began with the draining of the marshy site and the creation of a network of canals and ponds; as early as 1712 the stone Summer Palace of Peter the Great was built here to a design by Domenico Trezzini — one of the city's first stone buildings, which survives to this day. To adorn the garden, marble sculptures were purchased on Peter's orders in Italy, chiefly in Venice; the garden was further embellished with fountains, garden pavilions ("lusthauses") and a famous grotto. Under Anna Ioannovna and Elizabeth Petrovna the garden's appearance continued to change: a cascade-amphitheatre by Rastrelli appeared, while the fountains, destroyed by the severe flood of 1777, went unrestored for a long time — the garden took on a more natural, landscape character, although the fountains were recreated from historical drawings during a large-scale restoration in 2009–2012.

A significant role in shaping the garden's formal layout was played by the French master Jean-Baptiste Le Blond, invited by Peter the Great in 1716 specifically to lay out parks for the new capital in the manner of Versailles.

One of the garden's principal attractions is its famous wrought-iron railing along the Neva embankment, created between 1771 and 1784 to a design by the architect Yuri Felten; the manufacture of the railing's 32 sections and gates was entrusted to master blacksmiths from Tula. Contemporaries called the railing one of the wonders of the world, and the poet Konstantin Batyushkov admired the lightness and elegance of its design. The garden preserves a collection of authentic and restored 18th-century marble sculpture, as well as a monument to the fabulist Ivan Krylov — one of the first monuments to a writer erected in Russia, put up as early as 1855.

The Summer Garden was traditionally a place where the people of Saint Petersburg could catch sight of the imperial family out walking; for a long time access here was restricted to a certain public, and it was only from the mid-18th century that the garden began to be opened to the wider public on certain days. Today the garden is open to all and remains one of the favourite places of relaxation for residents and visitors alike, preserving the atmosphere and layout of the Petrine era.