The building of Kunstkamera (in translation from German - "an office of rarities") has been put in 1718 on the project of the architect G. Mattarnovi. It intended for library and a collection "monsters and rarities", collected by Peter I

   During construction of the Kunstkamera proceeding from 1718 to 1734, several architects directed construction: G. Mattarnovi, N. Gerbel, G. Kiaveri, M. G. Zemtsov. In 1747 the heavy fire left from the building only the burned skeleton. The architect S. I. Chevakinsky in 1754-1758 managed to restore Kunstkamera, but without the top tier of a tower. This part of composition has been recreated only after the Great Patriotic War by the architect R. I. Kaplan-Ingel.
   Today in Kunstkamera there is a Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography created on the basis of Petrovsky collections which have considerably extended in the next years. Soon after the Great Patriotic War in Kunstkamera M. V. Lomonosov's museum has been open. The great Russian scientist has worked nearly a quarter of the century in this building. The collection of the museum is devoted to an initial stage of existence of Academy of Sciences and M. Lomonosov's contribution to history of the Russian science. Documents and objects of Lomonosov time, including scientific tools, books, portraits, engravings, including from personal meeting of the first Russian academician are exhibited at the museum.
   Now in the museum works several constant expositions devoted to ethnography of the people of America, Africa, China, Japan, Indonesia, Australia, Oceania and other countries, and also the "Anatomic Rarities of the St. Petersburg Kunstkamera" exhibition. At ethnographic exhibitions models of inhabited and cult constructions, traditional clothes of the population of various countries of the world, house utensils, instruments of labor, ceramics, art glass, products from metals, including precious, musical instruments, cult objects and ceremonial attributes, the traditional weapon are presented.

Address: Universitetskaya Emb., 3
Opening hours: 11:00-16:45
The day off: last Tuesday of month