Anyone who has walked from Gorkovskaya metro towards the Peter and Paul Fortress knows the Kschessinska Mansion (Osobnyak Kshesinskoy): an asymmetric house of pale brick with a small tower, wrought-iron railings and a huge glazed bay window. It is one of the finest examples of St Petersburg Art Nouveau, and inside is the State Museum of Political History of Russia. In late October, when it is dark by half past five and the wind comes off the Neva, it makes a good half-day plan: indoors, close to the metro, with real interiors and a story most people only know from textbooks.
On 19 October 2026 we checked the museum's official website for opening hours, ticket prices for Russian citizens and foreigners, the October schedule of group tours, the visitor rules and which exhibitions are open in the Kschessinska and Brandt mansions. Check the site before you go: tour schedules are published month by month.
🏛 The mansion as an exhibit: von Gogen's Art Nouveau
The mansion of Mathilde Kschessinska, prima ballerina of the Mariinsky Theatre, was built in 1904–1906 to a design by the architect Alexander von Gogen. The museum itself calls the building "a kind of benchmark of the Art Nouveau style": a free asymmetric composition, graphic lines, volumes of different shapes and a rich palette of finishing materials. Walk around the outside before you go in: from Kuybysheva Street you see the glazed bay in its metal frame and the wrought-iron fence with its typical Art Nouveau pattern.
The glazed bay window of the Kschessinska Mansion and the wrought-iron fence — Photo: Margarita Zakaryan, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
The museum occupies two houses, not one. In 1955–1957 a new wing by the architect Nikolai Nadyozhin linked the Kschessinska Mansion to the neighbouring mansion of timber merchant Vasily Brandt (1909–1911, architect Robert Meltzer). So inside you move from the ballerina's Art Nouveau into a Stalin-era lobby and on to Brandt's oak staircases.
💃 The White Hall and the Kschessinska exhibition
The heart of the mansion is the White Hall, where the ballerina held her receptions. The museum describes it as Classicism with touches of Russian Empire style: inlays of artificial marble, crystal chandeliers and sconces, parquet and mirrors. Fyodor Chaliapin, Anna Pavlova, Sergei Diaghilev and grand dukes of the Romanov family were guests here.
A state room of the mansion with mirrors, a fireplace and crystal chandeliers — Photo: Potekhin, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
A permanent exhibition, "Mathilde Kschessinska: Fouetté of Fate", is devoted to her life: stage costumes, photographs, documents and family belongings. It is included in the standard ticket. If you want a guide, there is a tour with the same name; in October the museum runs it at 11:00, 14:00, 15:00, 16:00 and 18:30, including the White Hall. Tours are in Russian.
🚩 1917: Lenin's office and the balcony
In spring 1917, after the February Revolution, Kschessinska left the mansion; first soldiers of an armoured division moved in, then the Bolsheviks. According to the museum, from March to early July 1917 the Central and Petersburg Committees of the Bolshevik party and its Military Organisation worked here, and Lenin was a regular. The mansion's balcony is often called "Lenin's balcony"; the museum's website does not describe that episode separately, but the rooms themselves are preserved.
Lenin's office in the mansion, photographed in 2011 — Photo: sailko, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
On the first floor up, within the exhibition "Revolution in Russia. 1917–1922", are the memorial rooms of the party secretariat and "Lenin's Office". They were refitted in April 2025 with added historical detail, so they may look different from older photos.
