The Hanging Garden

The Hanging Garden is an architectural construction characteristic of 18th-century palace ensembles. It is located at the level of the second storey of the building of the Small Hermitage. In the middle of the 19th century, the garden was reconstructed to the plans of the architect Vasily Stasov, who employed the latest achievements in construction technique and landscape design. Stasov changed the layout of the garden, having paths intersecting in the centre and a walk right around the outside. The upper part of the walls were girdled with galleries that had openwork railings entwined with plants. From the 1843 record of planting, we know that honeysuckle, lilac, apple-trees, rhododendrons, sea-buckthorn, flowering raspberry, currants, sand cherry and other trees and shrubs were bedded out.