Museum-Reserve - Alupka State Palace and Park

Almost in the center of Alupka among the greenery of the ancient park stands the majestic Vorontsov Palace - a unique architectural monument of the first half of the XXI century. Built in the era of romanticism, it amazes the modern viewer with a bright originality of architectural forms. The original layout, an interesting stylistic solution of each of the buildings, the skill with which the walls are laid and, finally, the interior decoration - all this has delighted more than one generation of lovers of beauty. Hundreds of serfs and freelance workers – masons, carvers, carvers, carpenters – have invested their talent and work here. At the same time, the terrain was so skillfully used that it seems that the palace grows out of the surrounding nature. The palace was built as a summer residence of a prominent statesman of Russia, Governor-General of the Novorossiysk Territory M.S. Vorontsov (1782-1856). The son of the Russian ambassador to England, he received a brilliant home education. Returning to Russia at the age of nineteen, he became a participant in the Russian-Turkish and anti-Napoleonic wars. He showed personal courage and distinguished himself in the battles of Smolensk and Borodino. From 1815 to 1818, in the rank of lieutenant general, he commanded the Russian occupation corps in Paris. From 1823 he was Governor-General of the Novorossiysk Territory, and from 1844 and the Caucasus. Two years before his death, Vorontsov was awarded the title of Field Marshal. In the era of rapid economic development of Russia and especially the intensive formation of capitalism in the south of the country, he was the initiator of the development here of tobacco, viticulture, winemaking, horse breeding and sheep breeding. At this time, the first steamships began to walk along the Black Sea, the first highway was built in the Crimea. He did not forget about his own income. To increase them, he sought to expand his possessions, buying up land in southern Ukraine, Bessarabia and the Crimea. One by one they passed to the Vorontsov family plots in Alupka, Massandra, on Cape Martyan, in Ai-Danil, Gurzuf, Ak-Mosque, Kokkozy, on yail – only about two thousand dessiatines of the Crimean land. For the arrangement of these properties and, mainly, Alupka, in Russia and abroad, the search for architects, gardeners and masters of all construction specialties begins. The palace was designed by English architect Edward Blore (1789-1879). In the development of English romanticism of the first half of the XIX century, a great role was played by the fascination with ancient monuments, their study and restoration. Blore devoted himself to this activity in his younger years. He was later the court architect of George IV, then Queen Victoria. He owns projects of Westminster Abbey, part of the facade of Buckingham Palace, some manor buildings, both on the continent and in the former English colony of Australia. But perhaps most independently and fully his gift was revealed in the project of the Alupka Palace. Initially, the palace was built according to another architectural plan, the work on which was carried out from 1825 to 1828. Odessa architect Francesco Boffo, who stood for Vorontsov Palace in Odessa, and, as established on the basis of archival research, a researcher of the Alupkin Palace-Museum L.N. Timofeev, English architect Thomas Harrison. According to this project, preparatory work had already begun in January 1829. However, suddenly in June 1831, Vorontsov, who was then in England, received an order to temporarily stop construction. Apparently, the customer felt the changes in the tastes and moods of society. It seems that Vorontsov many pavilions and houses in his Alupka, embodying various historical styles, wanted to supplement "Gothic set". And Blore was exactly the architect who managed to satisfy this desire. In just one year he completed the order, and immediately in December 1832 began the construction of buildings for a new project under the supervision of architect William Gunt sent from England. Blore never came to Alupka. But obviously he was well aware of the terrain. The architect took into account that the foundations were already ready and that there was the first masonry of the deep portal niche of the central building. Both are part of a new project. However, in general, it was fundamentally different from the original. This was a statement of completely new, in comparison with classicism, architectural and building principles. Instead of a geometrically strict grouping of buildings, Blore picturesquely placed them in the direction from west to east, corresponding to the movement of the mountains, thanks to which the palace very organically "fitted" into the surrounding landscape and found its own unique artistic and expressive image. From the hull to the hull, a visual idea of how medieval architecture developed, from early forms to the XVI century. The emphasis is made on the English version of architecture. The main entrance to the palace is on the west side. The traveler meets a typically feudal castle - a fortress of the VIII - XI centuries. Round monumental watchtowers, blank walls, enclosed spaces. Such are the courtyard of economic buildings and the narrow, harsh medieval passage leading to the central building High jagged walls of coarse masonry, slit-shaped windows-holes complement the feeling of inaccessibility. And only the openwork cast-iron hanging bridge, on which the musicians passed to the choirs of the main dining room, brings an unexpected lyrical note to the harsh atmosphere. The further away from the arch of the western entrance, the more the signs of the architecture of subsequent epochs are layered. In the courtyard after a feeling of isolation suddenly appears a stream of light and fresh air. The amazing beauty of the landscape with the top of Ai-Petri in the distance, "mounted" in the architectural frame, one face of which is the clock tower, the other - the eastern wing. Below the landscape is bounded by a supporting wall with a fountain in the center. Wide-open eyes-windows look at the park the northern facade of the main building. It most illustrates the Tudor style typical of sixteenth-century England. From the plane, the walls are advanced at different levels - the central part with a front entrance, bay windows and side rizalites with towers under onion domes. The facade is emphasized by narrow, multifaceted semi-columns, crowned with decorative tops – pinacles. The large surface of the glazed space in the building, pointed upwards of the dome, elegantly shaped pinakli, teeth and smokestacks with peaks in the form of flowers visually facilitate the massive masonry of walls and rough texture of the stone. In the carved stone decorations of the palace, the similarity between the individual style-forming elements of Eastern and Western architecture is successfully expressed. For example, between Gothic smokestacks and mosque minarets. This similarity is reinforced with the transition to the southern facade of the main building. Open towards the sea, always illuminated by the sun, it has an elegant and festive appearance, changeable and bizarre outlines. The main decorative decoration of the palace - the motif of a gentle, pointed, horseshoe-shaped, keel-shaped arch - is repeatedly repeated in the cast-iron balcony balustrade, and in the stone carved grille enclosing the roof, and, finally, in the decorative decoration of the portal of the southern entrance, decorated with oriental pomp. A horseshoe-shaped cancer, a two-tiered vault, a magnificent carving of plaster in a niche where the drawing of a Tudor flower and a lotus motif are intertwined, are completed by a six-fold repeated Arabic inscription on the frieze: "There is no winner but Allah". The artistic image of the palace was greatly influenced by the literary hobbies of that time. When it was created, the knightly novels of Walter Scott and the wonderful Arabian tales were equally popular. Suffice it to recall that in the 1830s, Ivanhoe by V. Scott and Alhambra by V. Irving began to be translated into Russian. That is why the inscription of the Alhambra (the palace of the Spanish caliphs of the XIV century) was in Alupka. But even more tried to imitate the romance of the beautiful, mysterious, ever changing nature. The organic unity of the palace with it can serve as an example for more than one generation of architects. The organic fusion of the forms of the palace with nature is surprisingly complemented by the drawing of Ai-Petri Mountain. From the side of Alupka, it resembles the ruins of a medieval Gothic castle. These natural picturesque ruins are the main dominant of many landscapes of the architectural and park ensemble. The construction of the palace used mainly the work of serfs from Vladimir and Moscow provinces. These were hereditary stonecutters and stonecutters, who passed on from generation to generation the art of erecting and relief decoration of magnificent white-stone cathedrals. The main building material - diabase of magmatic origin, greenish-gray color to become the color of the mountains and evergreen vegetation - was taken from natural placers in Alupka. Even the foundation of the palace was partially served by diabaz rocks. It is a very hard stone, almost twice as hard as granite, and very capricious in processing. The wrong hammer of the master - and all the work is in vain. From huge shapeless blocks were carved smooth blocks for walls and complex decorations. Diabaz was carefully polished for interior decoration. Everything was done manually with primitive tools. Among the serfs were many talented craftsmen - contractor Gavriil Poluektov, sculptor Roman Furtunov, carpenters Yakim Lapshin, Maxim Tislenko, Naum Mukhin and others. It was possible to identify the names of more than 300 serfs who worked on the construction of the palace. The palace complex consists of several buildings that make up a single architectural ensemble - central, dining room, guest, library and household. The guest building subsequently received the name of Shuvalovsky, since in its right part the chambers of Vorontsov’s daughter Sophia Mikhailovna were located, in the marriage of Countess Shuvalova. The construction of the palace began with the dining room (1830-1834). The central building was built in 1831-1837. In 1841-1842, a billiard room was added to the dining room. In 1838-1844, the guest corps, the eastern wings, all the towers of the palace, the pentagon of economic buildings were built, the ceremonial courtyard was designed. The last was the library building (1842-1846). The largest volume of excavation work was carried out from 1840 to 1848 with the help of soldiers of the sapper battalion in the construction of the park terraces in front of the southern facade of the palace. In the summer of 1848, sculptural figures of lions were installed on the central staircase leading to the main entrance, made in the workshop of the Italian sculptor Giovanni Bonnani. The lion terrace completed the construction and decoration of the palace ensemble.