I was already having a hard time believing what my eyes were seeing. Then we walked into the Great Hall or the Hall of Lights. This is a massive, virtually empty hall save for two pianos. It stretches the entire width of the palace. The central portion was roped off so visitors are only allowed to walk along the edge of the room near the walls. And it became very obvious why we were issued booties. The flooring looked like a fine geometric painting. There was not even the slightest gap between the pieces of wood. Above on the ceiling was a fresco titled “The Triumph of Russia”, depicting three scenes of Russian allegory and history. The fresco covers the entire ceiling, stretching wall to wall, north to south, east to west.
There are, I’d guess, 30 or more arched windows along the longer sides of the rectangular room that let in plenty of light. And the light certainly poured in through them today.
There’s a good reason for the number of windows in this hall. Supposedly St. Petersburg only gets about 30 days of sunshine per year. Any design that can make the most of the limited amount of light is more than welcome, especially during those “nine months of expectation.” And accenting every window, every pillar between the windows, every door, were moldings, cornices, and figurines. All gilded, of course. Though the Great Hall had plenty of light coming in, many of the other rooms were not as well lit, making photography in these spaces quite a challenge.
We moved through and past many more rooms such as the White State Dining Room with its gold-framed paintings and blue and white tiled stove. A sharp turn then put us at one end of the Golden Enfilade…and into a traffic jam. I’m sure most of the guests had their breath taken away right here. Mine was.
All of the rooms are aligned so when you look through a doorway, you have an unobstructed view from one end of the palace to the other. Archways and walls along the enfilade are protected by acrylic rising to a height of close to seven feet. An obvious modern addition with an obvious reason for adding it. All of the doorways are decorated with figurines and trim; again, all gilded.
I think it was at this point that it started to dawn on me just how much gold was used in this building. And we still hadn’t seen everything. This vista of the enfilade was staggeringly impressive!
The Amber Room
Without a doubt, the most famous room in the palace is what is known as the Amber Room. It was a gift to Tsar Peter I from Frederick William I of Prussia in 1716. Back then, it was well known among all of Europe’s monarchs that the best way to get into Peter I’s good graces was to give him a unique gift.
The Amber Room is a chamber designed and sculpted by the finest Prussian baroque sculptors and architects. Decorated with amber and gold and other precious stones and gems. It is said to contain around six tons of gold leaf, semi-precious stones, and amber. Yes, the fossilized tree sap/resin type of amber. Think Jurassic Park. Since ancient times, amber has been considered a highly-regarded gemstone.
The room was shipped in panels and installed in the palace. Colors in this room range from various tones and shades of white, yellow, red, and brown. Depending on how the light strikes any part of a wall, it appears to glow. This room alone is said to be valued at somewhere between US $140 to $500 million in today’s dollars.
During World War II, the contents of the room mysteriously disappeared or were looted by the Nazi army, depending on your source. Restoration of the Amber Room began in 1982 and was completed in 2003, as part of St. Petersburg’s tercentenary celebration. Photographs and archives helped Russian art experts to fashion thin amber pieces so that they exactly match the original in shape and color, and to carve the fine ornaments, thus recreating this legendary wonder once more.
I’d love to show you some pictures from this spectacular room but we were not allowed to do any photography in here. But there are plenty of photos of the room online. Amber Room on Wikipedia is a good starting point. The Amber Room story on Atlas Obscura is another good one. If you are really into details, the Gem Institute of America (GIA) has a pretty comprehensive account titled “The History and Reconstruction of the Amber Room“. I was even more impressed by what I learned in my research of the room after we got back home.
The Crimson Pilaster Room, and the Green Pilaster Room greeted us next. In the Portrait Hall, there was a statue of Empress Elizabeth wearing a replica of her ball gown. I found it interesting that embroidered on the gown was the State Emblem of Russia. 
Soon we found ourselves in the Picture Hall. There are 130 paintings here, arranged like a collage but each is separated by a gold frame. Exquisite work here on the parquet floors. And the cornice. Another wall-to-wall fresco on the ceiling can be found in this room, too.
The Chinese Drawing Room features a large portrait of Alexander I. This room differs slightly in that the walls are lined with floral patterns on Chinese silk. But in keeping with the theme of the rest of the palace, there are intricate parquet floors, gold trim, and small frescoes on the ceiling.
Mounted on some of the walls of some of the hallways were porcelain plates and vases. The white of the walls allowed the colors of the artwork on these pieces to stand out. These almost get lost when compared to what can be found in the other rooms. But these pieces are just as elegant.
We walked through room after room, hall after hall, chamber after chamber. I spent most of the time spellbound. I pretty much just stared in awe at the utter opulence. I just could not comprehend it. Still can’t.
Outside the Palace
You really can’t appreciate how massive this palace is until you see it from outside. And eventually we did head outside and into the garden. As you would expect, it was a massive garden. This part outside the palace is known as Catherine Park. It is home to well-manicured and maintained grounds, highlighted by fanciful curls of colored gravel and grass, punctuated by the occasional statue. Sculpted hedges line the walkways. Keep walking and you’ll find a lake and two ponds. The famous Cameron Galley and a few other buildings are located here but we did not go inside them.
Before we left, we visited a gift shop just outside the palace. They had some nice items but I did not see anything I really wanted to buy. Right across from the gift shop were a few street vendors. My guess is that they had either permission or a license to set up shop here. I found one middle-aged man who seemed eager to get rid of some of his wares. Not in a used car salesman way, though. My impression was that he was either trying to get rid of his older stock so he could buy some more, or to sell off his inventory so he could move on to another project.
At any rate, through his broken English we struck up a conversation and I ended up buying several things from him; a deck of cards, a couple of other souvenirs for co-workers, and some items dating back to the time of former Soviet Union. And I learned an interesting thing from dealing with him: though Russia accepts the Euro – which I thought I understood to be the currency we should use while here – he preferred US dollars. I was happy to oblige him. But I wondered how many other vendors preferred US dollars. Larger brick and mortar stores? Smaller independent ones? Street vendors? Or was it just him?
While I waited for the rest of our group to regroup, I took some photos of the magnificent gilded domes and figurines atop the palace’s chapel. I wonder how much maintenance is required to keep all of this so shiny. It looks almost like it was just fashioned and installed yesterday.
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