The Twelve Collegia, or Twelve Colleges is the largest edifice from the Petrine era

Petrine Baroque

Petrine Baroque is a name applied by art historians to a style of Baroque architecture and decoration favoured by Peter the Great and employed to design buildings in the newly-founded Russian capital, Saint Petersburg, under this monarch and his immediate successors.Unlike contemporaneous Naryshkin...

 still extant in Saint Petersburg

Saint Petersburg

Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...

. It was designed by Domenico Trezzini

Domenico Trezzini

Domenico Trezzini was a Swiss Italian architect who elaborated the Petrine Baroque style of Russian architecture.Domenico was born in Astano, near Lugano, in the Italian-speaking Ticino . He probably studied in Rome...

 and Theodor Schwertfeger and built from 1722 to 1744.

Description

The three-storey, red-brick complex of 12 buildings is 400–440 meters long, giving an illusion of one enormous edifice. The result is an "austerely structured" complex with a "rustic style." The original design separated the 12 individual buildings. In subsequent restructuring, they would be connected to form the modern complex.

History

The Twelve Collegia was commissioned by Peter the Great, who wanted a place for the Russian government, at the time divided into 12 branches:

• The Senate (created in February 1711, eventually renamed "Council of the Empire")
• The Synod
• Nine colleges
  Collegium (ministry)
  The collegia were government departments in Imperial Russia, established in 1717 by Peter the Great...
  
  , which replaced the old prikazy system (subsequently replaced by Ministries in 1802 under the rule of Alexander I
  Alexander I of Russia
  Alexander I of Russia , served as Emperor of Russia from 23 March 1801 to 1 December 1825 and the first Russian King of Poland from 1815 to 1825. He was also the first Russian Grand Duke of Finland and Lithuania....
  
  ): Foreign Affairs, Revenue Collection, Justice, Expenditure, Financial Control, War, Admiralty, Commerce, Mining and Manufacturing
• Additional, or tenth college/ministry for trade

Modern use

Twelve Collegia presently serves as one of three Petrine Baroque

Petrine Baroque

Petrine Baroque is a name applied by art historians to a style of Baroque architecture and decoration favoured by Peter the Great and employed to design buildings in the newly-founded Russian capital, Saint Petersburg, under this monarch and his immediate successors.Unlike contemporaneous Naryshkin...

 structures for Saint Petersburg State University

Saint Petersburg State University

Saint Petersburg State University is a Russian federal state-owned higher education institution based in Saint Petersburg and one of the oldest and largest universities in Russia....

. The Twelve Collegia are the main complex of the university, which was founded in 1819 (it claims be the successor of the Academy of St. Petersburg, and dates its foundation to 1724), stands along Mendeleevskaya Line on Vasilievsky Island

Vasilievsky Island

Vasilyevsky Island is an island in Saint Petersburg, Russia, bordered by the rivers Bolshaya Neva and Malaya Neva in the south and northeast, and by the Gulf of Finland in the west. Vasilyevsky Island is separated from Dekabristov Island by the Smolenka River...

.

Footnotes

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