"Architect Silvio Danini - the last court architect"

State Museum of Architecture named after A.V. For the first time in Moscow, Shchuseva presents an exhibition of the prominent St. Petersburg architect Silvio Danini.

Creative way S.A. Danini is inextricably linked with Tsarskoye Selo. At the invitation of academician of architecture A.F. Krasovsky, he took part in the reconstruction of the premises of the Winter Palace for the young imperial couple Nicholas II and Alexandra Fedorovna. In 1896, Danini was appointed architect of the Tsarskoye Selo Palace Administration, and on October 5, 1911 he was awarded the title of Architect of the Supreme Court. At the turn of the century, Danini was constantly engaged in re-equipment, repairs, alterations in the Alexander Palace and during that time he introduced many technical improvements there. Emperor Nicholas II highly appreciated the work of Danini and called him "our architect."

In the “Anglo-Saxon style” of Danini, most private mansions and cottages were built in Tsarskoye Selo, as well as many medical, educational and charitable buildings commissioned by the royal family, for example, Nanny School, Hospital, Mother and Baby House, Institute of Experimental Surgery, House of Mutilation warriors and others. In the works of Danini, this style, with some enhancement of decorative forms and a focus on the picturesqueness of the whole composition, was an original version of the Northern Petersburg Art Nouveau.

In the 1920s and up to the beginning of the 1940s. The architect lived and worked in Leningrad. He did not remain aloof from the architectural quest of modern times. In 1926, he designed and built in avant-garde forms the building of the fire department of the Red October GRES in St. Petersburg.

The exhibition will feature photographs from the fund of the Museum of Architecture, drawings from the collections of the Tsarskoye Selo Museum-Reserve, as well as materials preserved in the besieged Leningrad and provided by the architect’s family.

The exhibition will be held from June 27 to August 19 in the building of the Pharmaceutical Order (Vozdvizhenka St., 5)