Our the tour of the Hermitage, moving from the Winter Palace to the Small Hermitage was a seamless affair. The tour entered the first floor Pavilion Hall occupying the Northern Pavilion of the building. Henry and I were both amazed at the splendor of this particular hall, a cacophony of crystal, white and gold, with touches of a delicate mauve-pink. The elegant hall was designed by Andrei Stakenschneider in 1858.  The soaring faux marble-clad hall, in a classical style with a logia of arches and other architectural details that were inspired by Ottoman architecture. The single most amazing feature of the hall itself is the Peacock Clock by James Cox, a fabulous large-scaled work with several mechanical birds embellished with intricate feathers of gold, all encaged in a large-scale elongated octagonal gilt cage. A small rotunda within the grand room creates an intimate seating area. The pale pink “marble” on the curved wall of this area contrasts with a design detail in black “marble” veined with pink white and gray. Simple columns capped with white ionic volutes, their cylinders in the darker “marble”, rest with doric footing on the wainscotting’s shelf and visually support the  dome-shaped rotunda above.  Further emphasizing this feature, the vaulted rotunda  above the seating area contains panels of white and gold, the larger ones containing oval paintings of classical figures. On the same side of the room, framing the private seating area, fountains in three colors of  marble hold white marble shells to catch “the tears” of cascading rivulets of water.  The floor of the Pavilion Hall is adorned with a 19th-century imitation of an ancient Roman mosaic. Two galleries running along the western side of the Small Hermitage  from the Northern to the Southern Pavilion house an exhibition of Western European decorative and applied art of the 12th to the 15th century as well as fine art from the Low Countries (Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) dating from the 15th and 16th centuries.

PHOTOS: Left Column: 1. View of the barrel vaulted first floor logia on the perimeter of the Pavilion Hall. 2. The Peacock Clock by James Cox. 3. The fountain with rococo elements framing the intimate seating area in the great hall. Top: The breathtaking view of the Pavilion Hall of the Small Hermitage. Center, Bottom: Detail: the intimate seating area in the Pavilion Hall. Center, Right: View of the rotunda above the seating area.

JOURDAN ARPELLE-ZIEGLER                                        BACK TO MAP  PAGE