Saint Petersburg
Russia's imperial city on the Baltic, built on water
Saint Petersburg was willed into existence on a freezing marsh, and it shows in its grandeur. Peter the Great's window on the West is a city of canals and granite embankments, pastel palaces and gilded spires reflected in the Neva River. The Hermitage spills across the Winter Palace, bridges rise nightly to let ships pass, and in midsummer the sun barely sets, casting the famous White Nights over the city. Russia's second city, with a metro area approaching six million, it remains the most European place in the country.
The city sprawls across the flat delta of the Neva where the river meets the Gulf of Finland, built on dozens of islands laced by canals — earning it the nickname Venice of the North. Barely above sea level at around 17 metres at its highest, it has always been vulnerable to floods surging in from the Baltic, now held back by a vast storm barrier. The northern latitude brings long, dark winters and the luminous White Nights of June, when twilight lingers until dawn.
Peter the Great founded Saint Petersburg in 1703 on land seized from Sweden, conscripting tens of thousands of laborers to raise a new capital from the swamp. It served as the seat of the Russian Empire for two centuries, the stage for the 1917 revolution, and — as Leningrad — endured a horrific 872-day Nazi siege. Today, restored to its original name, it is Russia's cultural capital, home to the Hermitage, the Mariinsky ballet, and an architectural ensemble recognized by UNESCO.