Pravda 10, St. Petersburg
Pravda 10 is a landmark building of the notable area of Saint-Petersburg often referred to as Dostoevsky's St. Petersburg by locals. Over time it has served as a residence of merchants, a tenement house, and later on, in the Soviet Union period, the building was used as Railway Club and afterwards as the Union of Food Workers’ “Palace of Culture”. After many years of abandonment due to the fire which destroyed most part of the building, it went through major restoration of what was left of the construction, and renovation to open as the one and only hotel under the name of The State Hermitage Museum. History Formation of the quarter between Zagorodny Prospect and Dostoevskogo Street, where the hotel's building is located, dates back to the beginning of the 19th century. Since 1739 Pravda Street was a part of Bolshaya Ofitserskaya Street and in 1829 it was given a name of its own: Cabinetskaya, as His Royal Highness Offices (Cabinet) were located here. It was laid to link Palace Village, located around the Vladimirskaya Church with the Life Guard of the Semenovsky Regiment lodgings. In 1932 Cabinetskaya Street was renamed after the Pravda newspaper, which was published in the area and from then the name remained unchanged. In the 1820s, the plot of Pravda, 10 belonged to merchant Chichev. In the 1830 the ownership was passed to I. Lbov, a merchant of the 1st Guild. The first mentions of the building itself date from 1835, when the initial architectural plans were submitted to the Administrative Board of the City. The initial plan made by architect Kholopov depicted a three-storey building with a front and 2 wings. The main residential section, consisting of two storeys, extended across the courtyard and was abutted by a three-storey wing on the right and a single-storey construction on the left, giving the building the look of a Russian letter “П”. The general style of the building and details of design evidently attributed Pravda 10 to the period of strict classicism. In June 1835, a new plan was submitted to Administrative Board of the City. The project suggested building of two-storey construction at the back of the courtyard, with a balcony of three windows and chiseled grating, and with the entrance to the garden located under the balcony. Architectural details of the façade were quite demure: plain window casing, every second window with ledges above. One wing was supposed to be of three storeys with six doors on the ground floor, the other wing – one-storey - with four wide openings and a door in the center, most probably to be used as a coach-house. One of the proposals of the project suggested closing of the clear passage to the garden by means of creating an addition to the main building for it to occupy the whole plot. This project was approved, and the addition was built. Yet another project for reconstruction of the building was proposed by architect A. Andrianov in 1837. At that