News
19 September 2011
Closing Celebration Fountain in Peterhof
Closing Celebration Fountain in Peterhof occured 16 and 17 September on the stairs of the Grand Cascade in front of the palace. Photo! Read more>>
25 June 2011
Red dawn in Saint-Petersburg (photo)
A festive ship sails along the River Neva during a pyrotechnics display as part of the Alye Parusa (Scarlet Sails) school leavers’ celebration on Saturday night. An estimated 3 million gathered to watch the festivities. Read more>>
04 April 2011
Dancing with the stars
Throwing down a bridge between contemporary ballet and the era of the Imperial Russian Ballet, the International Dance Open Festival comes to town this week for the 10th time, showcasing some of the world’s finest talent. Read more>>
13 March 2011
Gazprom may build Okhta tower in northern St. Petersburg
A subsidiary of the Russian energy giant Gazprom has bought a plot of land in the northern part of St. Petersburg where it may build a 400-meter tall skyscraper.A spokeswoman for the Okhta Business Center company said the construction of the Okhta Business Center on a plot of 140,000 square meters in St. Petersburg's Primorsky District is yet to be approved. Read more>>
10 March 2011
Tourism Key to Petersburg Economy
Petersburg’s City Hall plans to bring the contribution of tourism to the Gross Regional Product of the city up to 20 percent, travel professionals are developing strategies to increase the incoming flow of travelers to the city.
“Today the contribution of tourism to the economy of St. Petersburg is about 11 percent of local GDP. We’d like to increase this figure to 20 percent in the next five years,” Alexei Chichkanov, head of the city’s Committee for Investment and Strategic Planning, said at a meeting of the Senator Club devoted to St. Petersburg’s tourism market held in February. Read more>>
04 February 2011
Governor tries to remove city's historic status
Actor Oleg Basilashvili and author Boris Strugatsky were among artists, teachers and rights activists who wrote an open letter to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on Tuesday asking him to deny City Governor Valentina Matviyenko’s request to exclude St. Petersburg from the Register of Historic Settlements. Read more >>
02 February 2011
Zenit set to swoop for Arsenal’s Arshavin
Russian Premier League outfit Zenit St Petersburg are set to swoop for Arsenal forward Andrei Arshavin.
Reports suggest that the 29-year old has become uncomfortable in London and Zenit are hoping he will return to Petrovsky Stadium where he made his name during an 11-year stint. Read more >>
27 January 2011
Russian ballet imports a Spanish dancemaker
Explaining his choice of celebrated choreographer Nacho Duato to lead St. Petersburg's Mikhailovsky Theater, arts patron Vladimir Kekhman complained that “already two generations of Russian dancers practically don’t know what a choreographer is who is also staging productions for them.” Read more >>
14 January 2011
In the spotlight: olympic gymnast Kabayeva
Last week, Alina Kabayeva, the Olympic rhythmic gymnast who is now a Duma deputy, poses on the cover of Russian Vogue in a gold dress, prompting speculation about Vogue’s sudden interest in rhythmic gymnastics and plenty of mean comments about the use of Photoshop to squeeze her voluptuous figure into a model-sized dress. Read more >>
11 January 2011
French architects win contest to design Zoo
A computer generated image from the winning zoo design.
The city’s new zoo will be built to designs drawn up by French architects on six islands in St. Petersburg’s Yuntolovo district in the Primorsky district, with each island symbolizing a different part of world. Read more >>
16 December 2010
Making interaction the key to art
Participation is an integral part of the Yota Space audiovisual arts festival, which concludes Sunday.
The 18th-century Mikhailovsky Castle started off a very 21st-century festival when its facade became the backdrop for a spectacular light show that started the country’s first large-scale festival devoted to the audio-visual art.
The building seemed to fold itself up, as if it wanted to put itself in a suitcase for a holiday, during the light show. Read more >>
10 December 2010
New train brings Helsinki nearer
The new train, named the Allegro, will cut the journey time to Finland by two hours.
A new high-speed train, the Allegro, will reduce the journey time between St. Petersburg and Helsinki to just three-and-a-half hours when it is launched on Sunday.
In order to reduce the journey time by two hours, modern rolling stock has been introduced, railway tracks reconstructed and border procedures accelerated. The new train, whose name means “fast” in Italian, can travel at up to 220 kilometers per hour. Read more >>
06 December 2010
The city is gearing up for the annual Arts Square winter music event
The Mikhailovsky Theater will premiere Janacek’s opera ‘Katya Kabanova’ as part of this year’s Arts Square festival.
The French connection is key to this year’s international Arts Square Festival, St. Petersburg’s premier classical arts winter event. The Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Chausson trio and pianist Francois Weigel will represent France at this year’s event, which is packed with performances of French composers’ work, from Ravel and Debussy to Boulez and Faure and contemporary masters such as Philippe Fenelon.
01 December 2010
Mammoth mall opens in city center
The giant new retail center Galeria in the center of St. Petersburg opened its doors to its first customers Thursday.
Galeria’s location on Ligovsky Prospekt was originally set to house a railway complex of high-speed lines. For this purpose, two historic buildings were demolished in the 90s. But at this point, work stopped and the site became known locally as “the pit behind Moscow Railway Station.” Eventually, the city decided not to give the plot to the railways, but to transfer it to business and build a large shopping center. Read more >>
30 November 2010
St. Isaac’s to End Higher Prices for Foreigners
The price for entrance tickets to St. Isaac’s Cathedral will be the same for foreigners and Russians from Jan. 1, 2011, said Natalya Koreneva, deputy director of the St. Isaac’s Cathedral State Museum and Monument Complex on Monday.
Koreneva confirmed information about the price change published by Vedomosti at the end of October. The changes will also apply to the Church of Our Savior on the Spilled Blood, which belongs to the same group of museums. Read more >>
28 November 2010
The Palace of Happiness & Weddings
The Angliyskaya (English) Embankment is one of the oldest in the city. The architectural look of St. Petersburg took shape very quickly, and 30 years after its foundation by Peter the Great the English Embankment was fully developed. It got its name in the second half of the 18th century – prior to that it was called first Nizhnaya, and then Galernaya. Amongst the owners of the houses and mansions there were many foreigners, including some Englishmen. At that time the English church was also situated at number 56, and there was also an English pub and shop on this embankment. Soon after getting its present name ‘Angliyskaya’ a granite facing was added to the embankment, acquiring a fascinating and festive appearance. During Soviet times it was renamed “Red Navy Embankment”. The pre-Revolutionary name ‘Angliyskaya’ was returned in 1996 during the visit of Elizabeth II, Queen of Great Britain. Read more >>
25 November 2010
Protesters throw eggs at gay rights demonstrators
Protesters holding Orthodox Christian church banners and icons, singing prayers and throwing eggs helped to bring the city’s first authorized lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) demo to an abrupt end in St. Petersburg on Saturday.
According to organizer Maria Yefremenkova, around 20 counter-demonstrators were already at the site of the planned demo when around 10 LGBT activists arrived. Read more >>
