Years of Ruin and Revival

Bolshevik government officials G. Zinoviev and A. Lunacharsky issued a decree for the Yusupov Palace to be nationalized on February 22, 1919, but fortunately for the palace, the Museum Committee under the Education Commissariat decided to conserve it as a public museum. The Yusupov Gallery, featuring art from the family collection, was opened to the general public on September 20, 1919. Tours of the historical rooms related to the assassination of Grigory Rasputin began in 1924. But the period when the Yusupovs' treasures were on display in their ancestral trove turned out to be pitifully short-lived. Like many other "noble nests" in the city, representing a lifestyle alien to the new ideology, the Yusupov Palace was closed in 1925, and thoughtless, uncontrolled plundering of its riches began.

Despite the adversities and neglect that followed the 1917 Revolution, the Yusupov Palace was better off than most other old aristocratic estates in St. Petersburg. Shortly after the museum was closed, it was handed over to the city's education community, and became the convention center and creative headquarters for Leningrad's intelligentsia. This way it avoided the fate of other "monuments to rich people's lifestyle," which were used and abused in the most barbaric fashion. The palace's gala suites and private rooms have survived relatively intact.

The Palace on the Moika shared the bitter fortunes of the city during the Russian part of WWII, hosting a field hospital as the Nazis laid siege to Leningrad. A sweeping restoration of the buildings and interiors, badly damaged by bombing and gunfire during the Siege, began immediately after the war.

In 1960, the Yusupov Palace was designated as a historical landmark of federal importance.

Following a dedicated, well-researched restoration effort, the bulk of the palace is now accessible to the general public, including the second-floor gala suites, art gallery, the amazing private theater, and the so-called "parents' wing": the prince's rooms and princess' elegant boudoirs, the private suite of Felix Yusupov, which recreates the historical scene of Grigory Rasputin's assassination, and Felix and Irina Yusupov's annex with recreated original interiors and a documentary exhibit on the family history of the Yusupovs from the 10th to 21st centuries.

The Yusupov Palace has retained its value as a truthful reflection of the lifestyle of Russian aristocracy. Having been home to one of Russia's richest and most influential aristocratic clans for nearly 100 years, the palace has volumes to tell about the ways, tastes and fantasies of its former noble owners, and as much about the prevalent mores and cultural milieu of the epoch.

Although much of the palace's erstwhile pictorial and sculptural splendor is missing, it is still a supreme masterpiece that cannot fail to impress with both its artworks and its well-preserved "homey" atmosphere.