St Petersburg News
Tsar's scents donated to museum
Mar 11th, 2013The museum Tsarskoye Selo received a collection of perfumes formerly belonging to the the last Russian Tsar Nicholas II and his family, the St. Petersburg Times reports. The flasks were donated by Zinaida Volodina-Pessoa, a representative of the...
Read more »Wax Figures of Russia Rulers Made in Petersburg
Dec 18th, 2012A St. Petersburg workshop is crafting wax figures of Russian rulers past and present for an exhibit ordered by the presidential administration. The project, which is financed by an unidentified private fund, has been running for several years and...
Read more »St. Petersburg hosts UNESCO session
Jun 24th, 2012St. Petersburg began hosting a session of UNESCO's World Heritage Committee on June 24th, with 36 sites being considered for inscription on the organisation's list of protected places. Choosing St. Petersburg, which itself is a world heritage...
Read more »Russia relaunches space race?
Apr 30th, 2012Russia has revealed bold plans for a renewed exploration of outer space. According to information released on Roscosmos, Russia's official space agency, the plans include the completion of a state of the art spaceport that will allow Russia to...
Read more »Hidden treasure revealed after ninety years
Mar 29th, 2012Workers renovating a mansion in St. Petersburg have chanced upon a hoard of hidden treasures. Over a thousand items of silver and porcelain were discovered between the floorboards at the house, which used to belong to the aristocratic Naryshkin...
Read more »Fishy goings on at the morgue
Dec 30th, 2011Police have seized a vast stash of rare caviar at a St. Petersburg morgue. The delicacy was found in canisters marked 'Aviation Security' inside the morgue's freezer. According to the police, the pots were placed next to bodies that were...
Read more »Daredevils leap from cathedral
Nov 28th, 2011Two audacious parachute jumpers leapt from the spire of St. Petersburg's Cathedral of SS Peter and Paul on Sunday 27th November. However, although the successful jump was apparently filmed and uploaded onto popular website youtube, the...
Read more »New Life of Old Imperial Clock
Nov 15th, 2011'The Mechanical Orchestra', the 18th-century clock commissioned by Emperor Paul I and now housed in the Hermitage is to be restored by 2014. The clock's re-exhibition after at least 150 years is to be a part of the museums 250th anniversary...
Read more »Croat wins St Petersburg Open
Oct 31st, 2011Croat tennis star Marin Cilic won glory at the St. Petersburg Open, taking the title in a three-set match on October 30th. The 23-year-old Croat trounced Serbian hopeful Janko Tipsarevic 6-3, 3-6, 6-2, before an engrossed St.Petersburg crowd. ...
Read more »Spend a night in the Hermitage?
Oct 30th, 2011The State Hermitage Museum will open a hotel under the same name, according to the hotels website. The Museum signed a memorandum with International Baltic Investment Company (MBIK) regarding the partnership, and a corresponding contract is now being...
Read more »Local director wings Golden Lion at Venice
Sep 28th, 2011Local director wings Golden Lion at Venice St. Petersburg director Alexander Sokurov has won the Golden Lion for best film at the 68th Venice Film Festival. Sokurov's adaptation of classic morality tale Faust beat off competition from veterans...
Read more »Armada of UFOs flies over St. Petersburg
Aug 23rd, 2011Aficionados of the unexplained were over the moon in August after multiple UFO sightings were registered in St. Petersburg. The unexplained guests appeared on the evening of 20 August. According to observers, an armada of glowing orbs illuminated...
Read more »Woman puts up dogged defence of flat
Jul 28th, 2011A woman who had kicked her parents out of their shared flat defended the property until the bitter end when bailiffs sought to remove her from the building. St Petersburg police had been trying to resolve the dispute for an entire year. The...
Read more »St Petersburg launches guest card
Jun 30th, 2011Following in the footsteps of such tourist hotspots as New York, London, Paris, Barcelona and Stockholm, St Petersburg has rustled up its own Guest Card, offering visitors discounts on some of the city's top attractions. The special card, which...
Read more »Boffins build miniature Russia in St. Petersburg
May 27th, 2011A team of over a hundred engineers, craftsmen and modelling artists are currently beavering away in a bid to recreate Russia in miniature. The vast concoction, which comprises of 800 metres squared, takes in lakes, rivers, mountains and forests,...
Read more »Sherlock Holmes inspires jewellery heist
Apr 25th, 2011Policemen in St Petersburg are claiming that a robbery in the romantic city was inspired by a plot from one of Arthur Conan Doyle's classic tales. The incident took place at a jeweller's in Russia's second city. According to police reports,...
Read more »Banksy bails out Russian artists
Mar 27th, 2011Famed British graffiti artist Banksy has paid the bail of two Russian artists who are awaiting trial for hooliganism. The artists belong to the controversial dissident Voina (War) collective, which was founded in 2007 by a group of philosophy...
Read more »In Rainbows
Feb 28th, 2011Gay rights activists painted a rainbow on the Moscow headquarters of the governing United Russia party after a draft law cast a shadow over gay rights in St. Petersburg. The rainbow motif was complemented by the slogan, you cannot ban us. The...
Read more »New Palace of Culture on the Horizon
Feb 24th, 2011Russian tycoon Roman Abramovich has invited some of the world's finest architects to take part in a competition to revive a battered St Petersburg island. The Moscow-based businessman, who is ranked as one of the richest men in the world, wants...
Read more »Tonnes of Tusks Swiped in Mammoth Pounce
Jan 28th, 2011A jaw-dropping hoard of mammoth tusks has been confiscated from a criminal gang in St. Petersburg. As many as 64 pristine tusks and 14 reconstructed ones were seized during the January sting. The arrested gang has allegedly been involved in...
Read more »Russia to host FIFA 2018
Dec 30th, 2010Russia got an early Christmas present when the golden envelope was opened on December 2nd and the Federation came out on top over joint bidders Portugal and Spain. St. Petersburg has already been put forward as one of the host cities. "You can...
Read more »Putin Dubs DiCaprio a 'Real Man'
Nov 24th, 2010Russia's PM hailed Hollywood heartthrob Leonardo DiCaprio as amuzhik ("a real man"), after the actor pressed on to St. Petersburg in spite of an engine failure and an emergency landing. The star of Titanic and Inception was in the romantic Russian...
Read more »St. Petersburg Gears Up For Tiger Summit
Oct 19th, 2010St. Petersburg is getting ready to host what's considered a critical attempt to save the world's tiger population. As the Global Tiger Initiative declares: "We aspire to a world where, by 2020, wild tigers across Asia will no longer face the risk...
Read more »Riddle Solved of Missing Tsar?
Sep 17th, 2010An archaeological team is claiming that the missing remains of an 18th century Tsar have been located. The group is now calling for a state burial in St.Petersburg. Ivan VI has been compared to Alexandre Dumas' 'Man in the Iron Mask', owing to his...
Read more »Gay rights backers press for march permit
Jun 17th, 2010The organisers of St Petersburgs first gay-pride march have recently applied for permission to hold the parade on the 26th of June. More than 500 participants are expected to take part in the parade, which will go from Konnogvardeisky Boulevard to...
Read more »Big Gay Bubbles and the Idiots Who Fear Them
Apr 27th, 2010A crowd of youths blowing bubbles have been attacked by a group of right-wing extremists in the center of St Petersburg. According to the organizers of the bubble-blowing flash mob event some 30 men were seen lunging at the peaceful crowd and...
Read more »Arts Square Festival kicks off
Dec 16th, 2009Visitors to the city this month will get the chance to re-live the grand heyday of Russian Imperial society with all its masquerades, balls and exquisite theatre performances when the Arts Square Festival begins at the Shostakovich Philharmonic, this...
Read more »Madonna - the Red Revolutionary ?
Aug 13th, 2009Were you at the city's Madonna gig last week? Can you vouch for Madge that she was sporting a Chairman Mao, oh so modest, buttoned up to the collar waist coat and that she storm trooped around the stage, raised a salute to a heroically positioned...
Read more »Maritime Magnificence in St Petersburg
Jul 12th, 2009A convey of age-old sailing ships, some with masts towering 120 feet tall, graced St Petersburg's waters this week as the city played host to the Baltic Seas Tall Ships Regatta.The highlight of the event was a grand sailing of all the ships entered...
Read more »St Petersburg Remembers
Jun 14th, 2009It's a season of anniversaries for St.Petersburg this month, as its 18 years since it was re-christened with its original name and 337 years since the birth of the man who started it all - Peter the Great.In many ways Russia's ancient capital has...
Read more »Travel Visa-Free to St.Petersburg
May 16th, 2009Some foreigners to St.Petersburg will soon be able to wave goodbye to the arduous task of queuing up for visas for their trip to Russia's most beautiful and visited city, after a new government bill is published on 20 May. The initiative will allow...
Read more »International Irish Dance Festival
Apr 28th, 2009St. Petersburg will be the host of the International Irish Dance Festival, which begins on May 4th. Irish Dance lovers from all around Russia, as well as Europe and the U.S. are coming to celebrate the festivities. The target of the event is also...
Read more »The Obama Ice Cream?
Mar 31st, 2009"It’s on everyone’s lips — the Dark is in the White!" says the line on an ad poster for the Duet Ice Cream. A Russian ad agency, which used a picture of someone very similar to the American President Barack Obama in their campaign,...
Read more »Exhibition On Afghanistan
Feb 23rd, 2009A branch of the Museum of Political History - Gorokhovaya 2 - invites everybody to a new exhibition called "Afghanistan 1979-1989". According to the exhibition's organizers, visitors will be able to get to know everything about Afghanistan - all of...
Read more »65th Anniversary Of Siege
Jan 29th, 2009Next Tuesday, St Petersburg will be celebrating the end of one of the most atrocious Nazi blockades, which lasted for 900 days. “This is a tragic and yet heroic page in our history" St. Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko said to The...
Read more »Rautakesko supplying St Petersburg
Nov 28th, 2008The mysteriously sounding Rautakesko is a Finnish company offering building and home improvement products. The chain operates in eight countries in the Nordic and the Baltic countries, Russia and Belarus. They own about 300 retail shops all over the...
Read more »Crash landing in St. Petersburg
Oct 24th, 2008A Turkish Airlines plane had to land in St. Petersburg on its way to Russia, after sending out a highjack signal over the Black Sea. The landing took place after one of the passengers sent a note to the pilot, saying that he has a bomb and will...
Read more »Helping South Ossetians
Aug 26th, 2008The city of St. Petersburg has been organizing a variety of humanitarian efforts in the last couple of weeks in aid of South Ossetians caught in the recent military conflict between Russia and Georgia. The city administration has opened a centre...
Read more »Saint Stalin?
Jul 28th, 2008An online competition to nominate the greatest Russian in history is being used by the Communist Party in St. Petersburg as the base for their petition to canonise Joseph Stalin. The poll, created by the state run Rossiya channel, shows the Soviet...
Read more »The Gazoskryob Chronicles Continue
Jul 2nd, 2008A new chapter to the "Gazoskryob" or Gasscraper tower chronicles was added on June 27th, with the 2 year long planning process growing more absurd by the day. Russia's state-controlled energy giant Gazprom has been planning the construction of a...
Read more »Zenit Victorious In Manchester
May 22nd, 2008The 2007 Champions of the Russian Premier League, Zenit St. Petersburg, won their first ever European trophy this May with a 2-0 victory over Scottish opponents Glasgow Rangers. Zenit were worthy winners in a game which they dominated, with Andrei...
Read more »Close at the Hermitage
Mar 3rd, 2008American artist Chuck Close has arrived in St. Petersburg for an opening of an exhibition of his works at the Hermitage. The artist, though severely handicapped and confined to a wheelchair 20 years, has continued to paint and travel to his own...
Read more »Dancing Robots On The Railways
Dec 21st, 2007Russian railway bosses are replacing man with machinery when it comes to difficult maintenance work on trains and tracks. The state-of-the-art Russian androids are thought to be more advanced than anything else out there, which apart from being a...
Read more »A Day At The Pig Races
Oct 24th, 2007This weekend will be an exciting one for residents of Lakhta, just northwest of St. Petersburg, as a major big pig racing event is planned. Pig racing in Russia can trace its history back to the 16th century when someone devised the distraction as...
Read more »Nuclear Waste Protesters Arrested
Oct 11th, 2007Police mounted a strong attack on protesters recently, after they unfurled a large banner in front of St. Petersburg's parliament denouncing the arrival of a ship carrying nuclear waste from Europe. The ship arrived from Rotterdam, Holland...
Read more »Lie Back And Think Of Russia
Sep 12th, 2007Yes, Wednesday September 12th, is officially bonking day in the region of Ulyanovsk in Russia. Well officially it's 'family contact day', but that's just a euphemism. Sergei Morozov is determined to raise the birth rate in his province and has given...
Read more »Chinese Warships In St. Petersburg
Aug 27th, 2007Two vast ships from China's navy arrived today in the port of St. Petersburg, but thankfully there was no cause for alarm from the local citizens. The guided missile destroyer Guangzhou and supply ship Weishanhu sailed into harbour with five hundred...
Read more »Gay Parade Rescheduled
Aug 2nd, 2007The organisers of St. Petersburg's gay parade have reconsidered their proposed date of the 8th September for their march, as it co-incides with the anniversary of the beginning of the Siege of Leningrad - a brutal three year siege by the Nazis in...
Read more »Mile High (Fight) Club
Jul 16th, 2007Well you've probably heard of the Mile High Club - maybe you're lucky enough to be a member - but it seems the citizens of St. Petersburg have their own Fight Club variant, if the latest reported incident upon their airways is anything to go by. ...
Read more »Thai Queen in Russia
Jul 2nd, 2007Queen Sirikit of Thailand arrived in Russia on Monday for a nine-day visit to Russia to commemorate the 110th anniversary of Thai-Russian relations, having been invited by President Putin. The Queen, now aged 74, arrives as the official...
Read more »Summer Gardens To Be Restored
May 30th, 2007St. Petersburg's famous Summer Gardens have won approval for restoration works. The Gardens were founded by Peter the Great in 1704 at his summer residence, Peterhof Palace, and were inspired by some of Europe's greatest parks. Fountains, statues,...
Read more »Rolling Stones To Play St. Petersburg
Apr 5th, 2007Legendary British rockers, the Rolling Stones are all set to play the Palace Square, St. Petersburg this summer. No one quite knows how any of the band are still alive after nearly five decades of misbehaving, let alone able to play their...
Read more »Russian Theatre Jams Mobiles
Mar 8th, 2007Yes, finally someone has gone and done it! And that someone is the manager of the Alexandrinsky Theatre in St. Petersburg. Fed up with the lack of consideration shown by mobile phone users during performances, the Theatre has had installed a phone...
Read more »Darwin rubbished in St. Petersburg
Dec 14th, 2006A Russian teenager at the Cervantes Gymnasium School in St. Petersburg has baffled authorities by suing the St. Petersburg city education council for teaching her the theory of evolution. The 15 year old Maria Shreiber claims her religious...
Read more »Ancic wins St Petersburg tennis title
Oct 30th, 2006He's tall and has a decent serve, and even though he's still no Goran Ivanisavic, Croatian Mark Ancic pulled off quite an upset when he won the St Petersburg tennis title on Sunday. Ancic defeated defending champion Thomas Johansson of Sweden in...
Read more »Google Choose St-Petersburg
Oct 23rd, 2006Google has chosen St-Petersburg as the base of its second research and development centre in Russia. After establishing its first Russian R&D center in Moscow earlier this year, the company says that this investment demonstrates its commitment to...
Read more »Zenit rewards loyal fans
Oct 4th, 2006St. Petersburg, Russia (AHN) - After driving for 9320 Miles to watch their team play in the far east of Russia, three fans of Zenit St Petersburg were offered a new car by the Premier League club as their old car could not make the return trip. ...
Read more »Tsereteli statue in St. Petersburg
Sep 27th, 2006September 25th saw the unveiling of a huge Peter the First made by Zurab Tsereteli in St. Petersburg. The monument presented to the city by the sculptor notorious for his love of big dimensions is 12 meters high. It has been set up on...
Read more »Racism rife in St. Petersburg
Sep 26th, 2006An Indian student was stabbed to death on Sunday night in the fourth racist murder in St. Petersburg this year. Indian students rallied outside the St. Petersburg Prosecutors Office on Monday, commemorating Nitesh Kumar Singh, the sixth-year student...
Read more »Empress reburied in St. Petersburg
Sep 22nd, 2006COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - The remains of Empress Maria Fyodorovna, mother of Russia's last tsar, Nicholas II, will be moved from Denmark to Russia on Saturday, finally fulfilling her wish to rest next to her late husband, Tsar Alexander III. ...
Read more »Blow-up dolls ride the river
Aug 31st, 2006St. Petersburg - Last weekend witnessed the unlikely event of the fourth annual blow-up doll rafting competition - officially known at the Bubble Baba Challenge - held near St. Petersburg. This highly entertaining contest saw 150 brave competitors...
Read more »Nicholas II in pictures
Aug 28th, 2006St. Petersburg, August 25, Interfax - The last days of the Romanovs exhibition of photos by Pierre Gilliar, the teacher of the children of the last Russian emperor, is set to open in the State Photography Center in St. Petersburg on Friday. These...
Read more »Fire destroys St. Petersburg cathedral
Aug 26th, 2006ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) - A fire gutted a 19th century cathedral in the heart of Russia's second city on Friday, destroying its famous azure domes which attract thousands of tourists every year. As flames leapt from the main dome of the...
Read more »War veteran honoured
Aug 8th, 2006A war veteran from Exmouth in the UK has flown to St Petersburg to receive the thanks of the Russian people for his heroism in World War Two. Ron Pettitt, 87, who earned the Distinguished Service Medal, is in St Petersburg for a festival...
Read more »Police hold two Hermitage suspects
Aug 7th, 2006ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) - Police have detained the husband and son of a museum curator on suspicion of stealing hundreds of artworks from Russia's world-famous Hermitage Museum, Interfax news agency said on Saturday. The suspects have...
Read more »Thieves hit Hermitage
Aug 1st, 2006ST. PETERSBURG, July 31 (RIA Novosti) - Over 200 jewelry items have disappeared from storage in St. Petersburg's State Hermitage Museum, the press service of the museum said Monday. "The loss of 221 jewelry items, most of which were enamels from...
Read more »Angel Orensanz exhibit coming to St. Petersburg
Jul 24th, 2006A joint presentation of the State Russian Museum with the support the Cologne (Germany) Ludwig Museum in St. Petersburg of a work of Angel Orensanz will mark the opening of this years Russian cultural Fall Season. The sculpture is called Sails of...
Read more »G8 slams N. Korea tests, backs Russia Nuclear fuel plan
Jul 18th, 2006REUTERS - St Petersburg - The Group of Eight industrialised nations condemned North Koreas recent missile tests and endorsed a Russian plan to create international atomic fuel centres to prevent countries from developing nuclear bombs. The...
Read more »Cherie Blair offers legal help to human rights groups in Russia
Jul 18th, 2006ST. PETERSBURG, Russia, July 17 Cherie Blair, the wife of Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain, on Monday stepped into the debate over Kremlin pressures on Russian civil society, offering legal assistance to human rights and aid groups to...
Read more »Dick to manage St. Petersburg
Jun 28th, 2006Dutch football coach Dick Advocaat has signed a two and half year contract to manage Russian premier league side Zenit St. Petersburg. Advocaat revealed that he missed the day-to-day challenges of club football, and refused to extend his deal at...
Read more »St. Petersburg antiterrorism drills ahead of July G8 summit
Jun 22nd, 2006ST. PETERSBURG, June 21 (RIA Novosti) - St. Petersburg will hold exercises Wednesday on counteracting terrorist attacks involving biological and chemical weapons in the run-up to a summit of the Group of Eight most developed nations in July. The...
Read more »Moscow-St. Petersburg toll highway to start in 2007
Jun 13th, 2006ST. PETERSBURG, June 12 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's economics minister Monday expressed hope that the construction of a toll highway between two largest cities in the country could start in 2007. "I hope that this new project will start next year,"...
Read more »G-8 energy dispute looms in St. Petersburg
Jun 7th, 2006(Reuters) Heated debate about the security of the world's energy supplies will dominate the agenda when the Group of 8 finance ministers meet this week to prepare the ground for the group's annual summit meeting next month. With the world economy...
Read more »Bird flu trial vaccine begins in St. Petersburg
Jun 7th, 2006ST. PETERSBURG,(Itar-Tass) - A 56-day clinical trial of a candidate vaccine against the highly pathogenic bird flu virus H5N1 begins in St. Petersburg on Monday. The chief of the health planning department of the Institute of Influenza, Yelena...
Read more »Police seize 40,000 Nokia handsets in St Petersburg
Jun 6th, 2006MOSCOW, June 6 (Prime-Tass) -- Police in Russia's St. Petersburg on May 6 seized 40,000 mobile handsets produced by Finland's Nokia that were illegally imported to Russia, the police said, Kommersant Business Daily reported Tuesday. A source in a...
Read more »From Russia with love - at Eyemouth
May 11th, 2006A CHANCE to hear Russian music is on offer in Eyemouth next month. Established in 1994 LYRA is a group of professional musicians aiming to introduce Russian Orthodox musical heritage as well as traditional Russian folk music to people taking an...
Read more »Grand Prix for 'Blockade'
May 8th, 2006Russian film director Sergei Loznitsa has won the Grand Prix at the 46th Cracow Film Festival. 'Blockade', a documentary about the Nazi siege of St. Petersburg (then Leningrad) is a striking work that is shot through with many haunting images. ...
Read more »Russia celebrates Victory Day
Mar 10th, 2006May 9th represents one of Russia's most celebrated holidays, the Victory of Soviet Russia over Nazi Germany in World War II. 25 million Russians died in the struggle, millions poor than even the Polish, Japanese (who suffered two nuclear bombs) or...
Read more »Russian Filmmaker Under Threat
Jan 22nd, 2006Russian Filmmaker Andrei Nekrasov has been quoted in the press as saying he is scared to return to his homeland, after he received ominous threats via his family. Nekrasov, whose recent works include 'My Friend Sacha: A Very Russian Murder' and...
Read more »St. Petersburg Skyscaper Criticized
Nov 22nd, 2002The director of St Petersburg's renowned Hermitage museum has spoken out against plans to build a 300-metre high skyscraper in the heart of Russia's former imperial capital. In an interview with the Guardian, Mikhail Piotrovsky said the tower would...
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