In order to surpass the palace and park ensembles of Europe, the fountains and their accompanying mechanisms had to function around the clock for several months, maintaining the necessary water level in the storage tank.

Hydraulic structures capable of solving the problem would have cost Peter I too much, and the landscape farther to the west would also be much more suitable with a natural water supply.

The German hydraulic engineer Burkhard Münnich succeeded in persuading the Tsar in changing course, and the construction of the fountains ended.

It was likely Michetti's architectural influence that Count Rastrelli designed a three-part through arch on the side of the main façade of the Winter Palace.

Following a fire in 1803, Voronikhin and Luigi Rusca made significant structural and decorative changes, including adding a belvedere and a ceremonial enfilade on the Piano nobile.

In 1847-1851, by order of the new owner, Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolaevich, another reconstruction was carried out by Christian Meyer [ru] and Andrei Stackenschneider: bay windows and balconies appeared on the facades; private chambers were decorated in the eclectic style.

The palace housed the personal apartments of the Greek queen Olga Konstantinovna, who lived in Russia after the murder of her husband George I.

For 45 years, the school trained hydrometeorologists, aerologists, radio operators, electrical engineers and ship mechanics for polar stations and the merchant fleet.

In 2000, the palace and its surrounding lands, covering more than 140 hectares, were transferred to the balance sheet of the Directorate of the President of the Russian Federation and large-scale construction and restoration work began.

[2] The result was not a restoration or a reconstruction of the original Michetti's design, but rather a close approximation that took into the account the evolution of the palaces over the centuries of its existence.

The statue was a copy of the sculpture installed in Riga by Gustav Schmidt-Kassel, which was originally built for the bicentennial memory of the Treaty of Nystad, when the Russian Empire annexed Livonia.

Several renovations were completed in anticipation of these major summits: A new facility, an excursion bureau, was built on the territory of the Congress Palace complex in early 2006.

The collection was put up for sale by Galina Vishnevskaya at Sotheby's, but the day before the auction it was purchased by businessman Alisher Usmanov and donated to the state.

[7] The exhibition presents 853 items from the collection, including eight works by Boris Grigoriev, whose name was banned in his homeland for many years, despite his worldwide fame.