Gostiniy Dvor

Gostiniy Dvor is considered one of the largest and oldest shopping centers in Saint Petersburg. It started with so called torgovie ryady (shopping rows), which appeared in 1705 on Petrograd island, where the modern Troitzkaya Square (formerly known as the Square of Revolution) is located. As practically all small shops were made of wood, they were burned down in 1710. Later the center was rebuilt in stone and so in Saint Petersburg the first bookstore had appeared.

It should be said that the construction of Bolshoi Gostiniy Dvor on Nevskiy Prospekt took a lot of time. The design was carried out by A. Rinaldi, but the first variant was rejected by the local authorities. In 1757 the project, worked out by F.-B. Rastrelli, was approved, but later it was also rejected because of it high cost. We can say that Ballen Delamont became the author of Bolshoi Gostiniy Dvor. As for Maliy Gostiniy Dvor, it was designed by the architect D. Kvarengy also in the style of classicism.

Bolshoi Gostiniy Dvor occupied more that 53 thousand square meters. It housed more than a hundred of small shops, which were specialized in cloth, fur, skin coat, silver, shoemaking, and other products. In the inner stores the wholesale was carried out, while the outer stores were busy with the retail sales. Bolshoi Gostiniy Dvor became the place where the first 25 out of 650 printed copies of Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow by A.N. Raditshev were sold. In the 19-20 centuries Bolshoi Gostiniy Dvor had undergone some changes. Some construction works were carried out. In the mid 20th century the internal walls were demolished and 178 small shops were united into one big department store. Nowadays Bolshoi Gostiniy Dvor has the area of 15.3 thousand square meters with more than 120 sections.