Occupies the place where early XVIII century there were three separate sections. The first of them belonged to Vasily Artemyevich Volynsky, son of the Cabinet Minister of Empress Anna Ioannovna. After the execution of his father, he sold the house to the treasury. The next owner of the plot of the Volynsk herds was artillery second lieutenant Pyotr Ivanovich Ivanovsky. From him, the territory passed into the possession of Johann Matveyevich Bulkel, and then - the wife of the Dutch merchant Login Petrovich Betling.

The neighboring plot, located downstream of the Neva, belonged to the builder of the Vyshnevolotsk canals, the merchant Mikhail Serdyukov. From him the house went to the English merchant Timothy Rex.

These two houses were rebuilt until 1822, when a single building of the court banker Baron Ludwig Ivanovich Stieglitz already existed here. In 1848, the entire state of the baron went to his son Alexander. Despite the unstable financial condition, in the late 1850s, Alexander Ludwigovich decided to enlarge and rebuild his St. Petersburg house. To do this, he acquired the neighboring mansion of State Councilor A.I. Beck.

The first owner of the site of A.I. Bek at the beginning of the 18th century was the shipbuilder Ivan Nemtsov. After Nemtsov's death, the territory went to his son-in-law, the architect Savva Ivanovich Chevakinsky. Later, the house was owned by the chamberlain of the court S. S. Zinoviev, Major General Pleshcheev, eminent citizen Bland, A. I. Beck. From the latter, the house passed to A. L. Stieglitz.

The new Stieglitz mansion on the Promenade des Anglais was built by the architect AI Krakau. The project was ready in 1859, the construction of the building was completed three years later. Krakau also built a complex of buildings on the side of Galernaya Street. There were the office of A. l. Stieglitz (No. 71), a servant's house (No. 71), two tenement houses (No. 54 and 69).

The wealth of the owner of the mansion was emphasized by the elegant front facade in the style of historicism. Magnificent interiors have been preserved on watercolors by St. Petersburg artists. Stieglitz built a real palace for his family. All the decorative and applied decoration of the house was created according to the drawings of Krakau. Paintings ordered through the artist V. D. Sverchkov served as interior details.

The suite of ceremonial rooms along the Neva was opened by the White Hall. Behind it was the Front Room, decorated with two canvases by the Munich landscape painters brothers Albert and Richard Zimmermann. A small walk-through room led to the Blue Living Room with a white marble fireplace and a plafond "Cupid Leads Psyche to Olympus" by the German artist Hans von Mare.

The walk-through living room was connected to the Dining Room. It kept three canvases, one of which ("Courtyard with a grotto in the Munich royal residence" by Hans von Mare) is now in the Hermitage. Two paintings for the Stieglitz mansion were painted in the studio of Carl von Pilotti. The banker's art collection included works by such German painters as Anselm Feuerbach and Albert Heinrich Brendel. All these paintings were not just part of the collection. They were specially ordered for specific halls, they were full-fledged and integral parts of the interior. In addition to paintings, the Stieglitz house kept a collection of tapestries and tapestries.

The largest hall in the palace of A. L. Stieglitz is the Dance Hall, decorated with French crystal chandeliers. On the second floor there were also Black and Moorish drawing rooms. On the ground floor were the living quarters of the owners.

Alexander Ludwigovich settled in his house on the English Embankment immediately after finishing the premises, in 1862. He lived on an annuity from the three million annual income, did charity work. He kept his huge capital only in Russian banks, which was rare for that time (and even today). Stieglitz funded the construction railways, founded the School of Technical Drawing in St. Petersburg and its branches in other cities. A number of objects of arts and crafts from the mansion were transferred to the Stieglitz school as exhibits.

Having no children of his own, Alexander Ludwigovich adopted a girl, probably the illegitimate daughter of Grand Duke Mikhail Pavlovich, Nadezhda Mikhailovna Iyuneva. She married a member of the State Council A. A. Polovotsov. A wedding gift from Stieglitz was a million rubles and a mansion on Bolshaya Morskaya Street (house number). After the death of her father in 1884, Nadezhda inherited the mansion on the English Embankment, and three years later sold it to Grand Duke Pavel Alexandrovich.

First Grand Duke saw Stieglitz's house on November 5, 1886, when he visited it with his brother Sergei. The Grand Duke and A. A. Polovtsov traded through Vice Admiral Dmitry Sergeevich Arsenyev. The owners wanted to get at least two million for the palace, while Pavel Alexandrovich expected to spend a maximum of one and a half. As a result, they agreed on a price of 1,600,000 rubles in gold.

The purchase of the palace by the Grand Duke took place before his first marriage - on Grand Duchess Alexandra Georgievna. She died after her second childbirth. In Europe, Pavel Alexandrovich secretly married Olga Valerianovna Pistolkors. The family did not accept the morganatic bran, and for some time the Grand Duke Nicholas II was forbidden to return to Russia. But after the death of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, permission to marry was given. The wife of the Grand Duke received the title and surname of Countess Hohenfelsen, and in 1915 - the title and surname of Paley. The Palace on the Promenade des Anglais was maintained in good condition even during the long stay of his masters abroad.

Selling the house, Polovtsov advised Pavel Alexandrovich to live here without altering the interiors for at least some time, to get used to the house. The advice was not accepted. To work on the new interiors of the mansion, the architect M. E. Messmacher was immediately invited. He redecorated the living quarters on the east side of the ground floor. Until recently, the Cabinet with a carved oak ceiling and a fireplace was preserved there. Somewhat later, the architect N.V. Sultanov equipped a church on the second floor of the courtyard wing. She didn't survive.

In 1898-1899, the private rooms of the Grand Duke in the western part of the ground floor were remodeled by the English firm Mape and Co. The Cabinet, Library and Billiard Room were redesigned. In the Concert Hall and the Reception Hall, the company of F. Melzer renovated the parquet floors.

After 1917, the paintings from the Stieglitz Palace were transferred to the All-Union Association "Antiques". With few exceptions, their fate is unknown.

In 1918, Pavel Aleksandrovich was shot. Princess Paley with the children went to Paris. The palace was nationalized. For a long time it housed various institutions. In 1968, he was taken under state protection.

In 1988, the restoration of the building began. It was supposed to be used for museum purposes. But the revolutionary events of the 1990s interfered with these plans. The palace again passed into private hands, for a long time it was empty. The interiors have fallen into disrepair and are in urgent need of restoration. In 2011, the house of A. L. Stieglitz was transferred to St. Petersburg State University.

Double address: 68 Angliyskaya Embankment / 69-71 Galernaya Street.

Mansion of Baron A. L. Stieglitz - Palace of Grand Duke Pavel Alexandrovich.
1852-1862 - architect A. I. Krakau.
1887-1889 - architect M. E. Messmacher - alteration (Draft between the first and second floors. The lower floor is rusticated. There is a small portico in the center of the main facade. A wide frieze is decorated with molding).

On the site of the mansion of Baron A. L. Stieglitz, there were two residential buildings. One of them was built in 1716 and was the first stone house on the Promenade des Anglais. It was built by Ivan Nemtsov - a ship's master. After him, his son-in-law, the famous architect S. I. Chevakinsky, owned the house. The second house was owned by the merchant Mikhail Serdyukov, the builder of the canal system in Vyshny Volochek.

For Grand Duke Pavel Alexandrovich, the youngest son of Alexander II, the palace was bought in 1887 from N. M. Polovtseva, the adopted daughter of the baron. His alteration was entrusted to M. E. Messmacher. The architect completed it by the wedding day of the Grand Duke with the Greek Queen Alexandra in 1889. After his young wife died in 1891, Pavel Aleksandrovich moved to Tsarskoe Selo.

In 1917, the palace, little used for many years, was sold to the Russian Society for the Procurement of Shells and Military Supplies. In 1919, the Grand Duke was shot in the courtyard of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

At the palace of Grand Duke Pavel Alexandrovich there was a church of St. Alexandra. The consecration of the house church took place in 1889. The temple was located on the second floor of a transverse courtyard wing and was decorated by the famous architect N. V. Sultanov in the Old Russian style. The decoration of the church was carried out in the workshop of K. E. Morozov. A two-tier iconostasis made of gilded zinc with 35 images was created there, and the royal gates from Medvedkov near Moscow were restored. The room was lit by an old copper chandelier. The utensils were brought from Greece. The walls were covered with ornamental paintings and images of saints.

In 1897, the facade of the church was decorated with stucco figures of evangelists and angels by MP Popov. The church was transferred to the Tsarskoye Selo mansion of the Grand Duke after his move, where it was consecrated under the name Blagoveshchenskaya.

The interiors of the palace are of artistic value. Among them stands out the main white marble staircase. The exit is made in the form of an arch with columns. The living room was decorated with caryatids. Draperies, gilded molding and carving were used in the decoration. The library is lined with oak. Krakau placed portraits of composers in medallions in the concert hall. The painter F. A. Bruni made sketches of the picturesque panels "The Four Seasons".

The courtyard was decorated in baroque style.

In 1938-1939, the right courtyard wing was built on one floor.
In 1946-1947, one floor was erected above the Moorish Hall.
Since 1999, the palace has been restored for the needs of the Lukoil company.