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(1744-1817)

Quarenghi was born in Bergamo, where he studied painting under G. Reggi, a student of Tiepolo, and P. Bonomini. While in Rome he became a student of Anton Raphael Mengs. In Rome Quarenghi got interested in architecture and studied it with S. Poudo. Quarenghi worked fruitfully in Italy and England. He was thirty when at the end of 1779 on the invitation of Catherine II, he came to Russia with his family. In Russia the architect stayed and worked till his death, he had 13 children, and some of them also stayed in Russia. In 1805 he became a corresponding member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts. Between 1788 and 1800 he served as an architect of the capital order of St. John of Jerusalem (Maltese order). In 1814 emperor Alexander I granted Giacomo Quarenghi hereditary Russian nobility and the order of St. Vladimir of the First Degree.

His works in Russia made Quarenghi one of the most famous architects of the 18th century. Quarenghi worked in both capitals of Russia: Moscow and St. Petersburg. The main projects are fulfilled in St. Petersburg and its suburbs: e.g.

The Alexander Palace (1792-96) in Tsarskoe Selo, and the pavilions in the landscape part of the Catherine Park, including the Concert Hall (1782 - 1786), the Kitchen Ruins (1780s), the Hall on the Island (1794);