Saint Petersburg: Museums, Palaces, and Historic Collections

by Cathy Giangrande

Saint Petersburg is, as we all agree, one of the most beautiful cities of Europe; but because of its chequered twentieth century history, it is still one of the least well known. For most of us Saint Petersburg is no more than an acquaintance. We are rill getting to know it and for such a a purpose we need all the help we can lay our hands on.You now hold in your hands the first guide book exclusively devoted to the lesser known museums in the city...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1593730004
• ISBN13: 9781593730000
• Release Date: September 2003
• Publisher: Bunker Hill Publishing Co
• Length: 96 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 6.2" x 7.2"

Customer Reviews

Nice little book on St.Petersburg but should include more places of interest

It's a nice little book on one of my favorite cities. I consider the book as a good beginning for those who want to discover all the treasures of St.Petersburg. There are more than 200 museums and their branches in the city. I have no idea what were the criteria for selecting those museums for the book but I decided to add more of them that, to the best of my knowledge, are available and could be of interest to travelers. Here they are: * Museum of Applied Arts * Museum of Music * Museum of Dolls * Museum of Non-Conformist Art * Museum of Beer * Museum of Hygiene * Museum of Water * Museum of Porcelain * Monument to the Heroic Defenders of Leningrad * Kresty Prison Museum * Rumyantsev Estate Museum * Memorial Museum of Ivan Pavlov * Memorial Museum of Alexander Blok * Memorial Museum of Feodor Chaliapin * Memorial Museum of Joseph Brodsky * Museum of Erotica * Yusupovsky Palace * Mining Institute Museum * Popov Museum of Communications * Museum of Electrical Transport of St.Petersburg * Marinesco Museum of Submarine Forces * Museum of Political Police of Russia * Museum of Coffee * Museum of Playing Cards * Museum of Subway of St.Petersburg * Submarine S-189 * Icebreaker "Krasin" * Museum of the Guards * Benois Family Museum * Museum of Wax Sculptures * Museum of Heraldry and Decorations * Dokuchayev Central Soil Science Museum So as you see from the list above the book should be at least twice thicker than it is now. Hopefully it will be in the next edition.

A Most Wonderful Book For St. Petersburg Visitors

I happened on this wonderful book by reading all the reviews written by one of its reviewers. It is small, light weight and so very easy to use. The pictures are beautiful. We went to St. Petersburg last December with the book in hand. Each night we decided where to go the next day. Planning is important because each museum is usually closed at least one day a week. Unfortunately the museums were so interesting, that we often stayed way longer than we planned to. We never would have gone to some of the museums had we not had this little book. We especially liked the maps showing the ocation of each museum in relation to the others. Because of this book, we will return to St. Petersburg in the off season and enjoy many more of its amazing little museums -- after all what better way is there to spend a cold December day?

Discovering St. Petersburg's 40 Unknown Treasures

As the founder of a company devoted to business and cultural travel to Russia, it pains me that so many tourists come to St. Petersburg for a day or two and only visit the Hermitage, Peterhof, and a ballet. Russia is like a Fabergé egg-a beautiful exterior with a hard-to-open but spectacular hidden interior. Among the little known gems in St. Petersburg are the Museum of Theatrical and Musical Arts, the Nabokov Museum (former residence of Vladimir Nabokov), the Russian Ethnographic Museum, the Rimskii-Korsakov Memorial Apartment-Museum, the History of Religion Museum (formerly the "Anti-Religion Museum), the recently-opened Museum of Toys, and the Museum of Russian Vodka. All these treasures and more are fondly catalogued in Cathy Giangrande's Saint Petersburg: Museums Palaces and Historic Collections (Museums). To appreciate this book a traveler needs to understand the unintentional irony of the chapter titled "Also well worth a visit are ..." listing the Hermitage Museum, one of the world's premier cultural treasures (and the most popular tourist site in Russia). It makes a great companion to such guides as DK Eyewitness's St. Petersburg guidebook (far more sights and coverage of the Hermitage, but without lengthy descriptions of lesser-known museums). Its small size makes this a "laptray book", but for the visitor in body or spirit to St. Petersburg is just as enthralling as a five pound coffee table book. One-to-four pages are devoted to each of the over 40 lesser known attractions in St. Petersburg. Each listing had a clear address, directions, phone and web site (if available). Books like this will help St. Petersburg, and Russia, become one of the world's premier tourist destinations in the next 10 years. There are literally thousands of such treasures throughout Russia as these listed here, but few people know about them. Truly, this book will help anyone interested in truly discovering Russia.

An outstanding guidebook to St. Petersburg

I began reading Cathy Giandrande's little guide to St. Petersburg with a great deal of skepticism. As I kept exploring the book, all my doubts quickly disappeared. That alone came to me as a surprise. Unlike most Russians who still suffer from a mild identity disorder, Petersburgers have a strong sense of local patriotism and know what they are and what their city is about. From time to time, their patriotism mutates into a peculiar kind of city chauvinism. It is taken for granted that no temporary visitor, be he or she from Moscow or Paris, can know the city or truly appreciate it. I am no different. As a Petersburger, I would never think that an outsider, least a foreigner, least someone from a culture many Russians perceive as hostile and extremely russophobic, would be able to put together a concise guide to the lesser known museums and landmarks of the city and do it in such a low key, friendly and unbiased manner, that the final work is a joy to read and is more useful from any practical standpoint of city exploration than many far weightier and thicker "serious" guides. Cathy Giangrande's St. Petersburg is a guide to the city museums and lesser-known landmarks. If the author "missed" any museums, then I have a feeling, that she excluded them deliberately because they are so obscure (like the Museum of Armed Forces Medical Academy) that almost no locals are aware of their existence. On the other hand, the guidebook contains information on some really obscure museums, such as the new private museum of toys. The book is a journey of exploration and is a pleasure to read "as is" from cover to cover. Alternately, it can be used as a helpful reference manual. The guidebook has its own share of minor irritants, such as the occasional misspelling of French and English words transliterated backwards, but they are not very significant. The book is beautifully printed on high quality paper and is richly illustrated with color photographs. It contains a helpful map or rather an outline plan of the central part of the city, a schematic plan of St. Petersburg region, and a well-designed plan of St.Petersburg "Metro" (or the city's subway system). All museum and landmark entries include detailed address and contact information, and indicate the nearest subway or suburban train station. Among all foreign languages guides and books on St. Petersburg, that I ever came across, this one is the only work that is worth translating into Russian. Even locals would find this book a great aid in exploring their own city.

A masterpiece among specialty city guides

I began reading Cathy Giandrande's little guide to St. Petersburg with a great deal of skepticism. As I kept exploring the book, all my doubts quickly disappeared. That alone came to me as a surprise. Unlike most Russians who still suffer from a mild identity disorder, Petersburgers have a strong sense of local patriotism and know what they are and what their city is about. From time to time, their patriotism mutates into a peculiar kind of city chauvinism. It is taken for granted that no temporary visitor, be he or she from Moscow or Paris, can know the city or truly appreciate it. I am no different. As a Petersburger, I would never think that an outsider, least a foreigner, least someone from a culture many Russians perceive as hostile and extremely russophobic, would be able to put together a concise guide to the lesser known museums and landmarks of the city and do it in such a low key, friendly and unbiased manner, that the final work is a joy to read and is more useful from any practical standpoint of city exploration than many far weightier and thicker "serious" guides. Cathy Giangrande's St. Petersburg is a guide to the city museums and lesser-known landmarks. If the author "missed" any museums, then I have a feeling, that she excluded them deliberately because they are so obscure (like the Museum of Armed Forces Medical Academy) that almost no locals are aware of their existence. On the other hand, the guidebook contains information on some really obscure museums, such as the new private museum of toys. The book is a journey of exploration and is a pleasure to read "as is" from cover to cover. Alternately, it can be used as a helpful reference manual. The guidebook has its own share of minor irritants, such as the occasional misspelling of French and English words transliterated backwards, but they are not very significant. The book is beautifully printed on high quality paper and is richly illustrated with color photographs. It contains a helpful map or rather an outline plan of the central part of the city, a schematic plan of St. Petersburg region, and a well-designed plan of St.Petersburg "Metro" (or the city's subway system). All museum and landmark entries include detailed address and contact information, and indicate the nearest subway or suburban train station. Among all foreign languages guides and books on St. Petersburg, that I ever came across, this one is the only work that is worth translating into Russian. Even locals would find this book a great aid in exploring their own city.