The Castle is oriented as a square with rounded corners, inside the square, there is an
octagonal inner
courtyard. The main entrance to the castle is to the south. Three angled bridges formed the link between the building and the square of the
Connettables in front of it, after the square of the same name in
Chantilly, the property of the
Princes of Condé that
Paul had visited during his stays abroad in June 1782. The building is located near the source of the
Moyka River from the
Fontanka. It was originally surrounded by water on all sides. It could be accessed via bridges guarded by sentry guards. The canal on the south side (reconstructed in 2003) came close to the basement. The building was approached from Italian Street through triple semi-circular gates, the middle passage of which was reserved for members of the imperial family. Behind them was a broad, straight avenue, along which were built the
stables and the
manège It ended at the three-storey corridor pavilions, beyond which the
forecourt fortifications began. At the end of 1798, Paul I became Grandmaster of the
Order of Malta. The appearance of Saint Michael's Castle combined Romantic sentiments and
Maltese symbolism. The enclosed volume of the building, the rounded corners associated with the round corner towers, created an image of a citadel of Order of Malta's knights. The development of the composition of the new imperial residence, through a series of variations, led to a square block with an octagonal courtyard which recalls both the round
Villa Farnese Palace in
Caprarola and its
pentagonal external silhouette, by the architect
Jacopo Barozzi da Vignola. The main south façade of the castle follows the arch of the
Porte Saint-Denis in
Paris, built-in 1672 according to the design of
François Blondel the Elder, the founder of
French classicism. It is known that in 1782, while still the heir, Paul was in
Parma during his travels in
Western Europe, and met with the French architect
Petitot. The design of the main façade of the
Ducal Palace of Colorno at Parma, commissioned by
Ferdinand I of Bourbon, Duke of Parma is an original combination of the composition of the Porte of Saint-Denis, with two obelisks and arches on each side, and the traditional façade of an urban palazzo with a triangular pediment. The facades of the palace in Parma and the castle in Saint Petersburg are almost the same. The spectacular octagonal courtyard of Saint Michael's Castle has prototypes not only in the classical architecture of Italy (the palace in
Caprarola), it goes back to the octagonal early Christian
baptisteries. Here, despite its seeming innovativeness, the deep Christian traditions of Saint Petersburg construction can be traced. Statues in the niches of the southern facade of Saint Michael's Castle are
personifications, symbolic of the
virtues of the ideal monarch. These include:
Power,
Abundance,
Victory, and
Glory, all related to the
chivalric symbolism of the Maltese order. The architecture of the colonnade of the state passage through the southern gate and the main staircase of Saint Michael's Castle correlates with similar compositions from
Baroque Western Europe, such as the
Royal Palace of Caserta near
Naples by
Luigi Vanvitelli. The mix of
classicist and
baroque motifs in the architecture of Saint Michael's Castle places it in a transitional period in the history of architectural styles in Russia. The classicist elements, together with Romantic ones, make up a peculiar "costumed architecture" in Saint Michael's Castle, which anticipates the
Empire style of the early nineteenth century. Sometimes the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries is called pre-
Romanticism in Russian art history, but in this case, it would be more accurate to say that the unique appearance of the Saint Michael's Castle represents not only pre-Romantic or Romantic architecture but is above all an architectural portrait of the Emperor himself. Image:Saint Michael's Castle South.jpg|St Michael's Castle (Southern facade) Image:Spb 06-2012 MichaelCastle.jpg|St Michael's Castle (Western facade) Image:Михайловский замок.jpg|St Michael's Castle (Northern facade) ==See also==