The concept of "guest house" appeared in Russia even before the reign of Peter I. At that time it was a building where merchants, merchants - those same "guests" - stopped to live and trade. For trade, they were assigned the so-called ranks, which varied in goods and services.
Shopping yards
For the first time, the guest house of St. Petersburg was founded and built on Vasilievsky Island under the direction of the architect Domenico Trezzini in about 1722. Its construction was justified by the fact that the port of the city was nearby, and there was nowhere to store imported goods. Thus, the Port Gostiny Dvor appeared, where visiting merchants stored their goods until they were sent to wholesale customers. There were no rows for retail and piece goods.
But since the building was wooden, it burned down, and stone chambers were erected in its place. Now there remains only a small fragment of the structure - the opening of the external gallery.
Then Apraksin Dvor, Passage shopping mall, Shchukin shopping malls, Andreevsky market, shopping malls on the Moika coast and others were built. In the XVIII-XIX centuries, fires broke out in St. Petersburg quite often and destroyed entire areas. For this reason, palaces were erected immediately in stone, and trade shops were allowed to be built in different parts of the city in order to avoid the destruction of all inventories and minimize losses for the city’s trade.
Suburban trade
In those days, the Neva prospect - the current Nevsky Prospect - was not the center of North Palmyra. And for the sake of fire safety, the malls were transferred to the city border "to an empty place ... from the Police Chancellery, going to the Nevsky Monastery on the right side of the promising road, and in the new market place for St. Petersburg merchants to give places ... with general agreement, in a linear fashion which lines to trade ”(K. Malinovsky,“ 17th Century St. Petersburg ”, p. 275).
Thus, a place was determined for the Great Gostiny Dvor of St. Petersburg - the most significant of all, but earlier there was a birch grove, for which Peter I executed several extortioners. The modern Big Gostiny Dvor in St. Petersburg is one of the central metro stations and a surprisingly preserved building of the 17th century.
The building was under construction for quite some time. Russia, in a constant state of war with neighbors who were trying to bite off at least a piece of land, could not find enough money in the treasury for the construction of stone shopping malls. And the merchants preferred to patch up the wooden buildings, justifying that everything was already occupied by the shops, and there were problems with the builders - the bulk of the craftsmen were involved in the construction of the Smolny Monastery and the Winter Palace.
The construction of the building in the style of classicism began in 1761 according to the project of Zh.B. Wallen-Delamot Decree of Catherine II. The construction burned several times, so it was forbidden to use wooden structures in the building being built.
The construction of the Gostiny Dvor of St. Petersburg was finally completed in 1785. And the trade began to boil - there were 147 shops in total, where you could buy goods from all over the world.
In 1837, in the Great Gostiny Dvor of St. Petersburg, the efforts of the merchants renting the premises carried out heating (a pneumatic firebox) and lighting by means of oil lamps.
Milestones in History
In the post-revolutionary years, the building of the Gostiny Dvor of St. Petersburg (Petrograd – Leningrad) was sealed, all merchandise goods were transported to warehouse distributors, and the premises were empty.
During the NEP, trade resumed, but the authorities of the young Soviet Republic repeatedly wanted to demolish or rebuild the building.
The Great Patriotic War crossed out all plans, but even then trade did not stop in the shopping center of the city despite the regular bombing.
In the postwar years, the Gostiny Dvor in St. Petersburg was repeatedly rebuilt, but without visible radical changes in the appearance of the structure. During repairs in October 1965, floors were uncovered in one of the buildings, and the builders discovered a real treasure that remained after the merchants Morozov who had fled from the revolution. It consisted of gold bars weighing 128 kilograms.
Tourist center of the city
"Gostinka" - this is the name of the Gostiny Dvor townspeople now. This is a large shopping complex that has preserved elements of past eras. There are shopping boutiques and pavilions with a wide variety of goods. They are mainly designed for tourists.
The opening of the Gostiny Dvor metro station in St. Petersburg took place in 1967. The entrance area of the subway is located in the basement of the building. Here you can make a transfer at the Nevskaya and Spasskaya Sadovaya - Sennaya lines, which is very convenient.
Leaving the building and turning left, you can see large sightseeing buses. A little further behind them there is an excursion kiosk. Anyone can purchase excursions from the Gostiny Dvor in St. Petersburg or a study tour to the museums of the Leningrad Region.
Centuries passed, but Gostiny Dvor remained the center of attraction for visitors to the city.