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The Red Garden

Behind «The Small Orangery» there was a site known as «The Red Garden», or «The Orangery Garden». In late 1730s in the Northern part of «The Red Garden» they laid out a flower parterre with a fountain on the central lawn. In the Southern part one could find greenhouses and maintenance buildings. There grew numerous fruit trees such as apple trees, pear trees, cherry trees. There was also a «medicinal» vegetable garden, the seedbeds of which were rich with different vegetables, «medicinal», «culinary» and «curious» herbs, fragrant and spicy plants. The combination of various flowering plants, vegetables and berry shrubs, alongside the geometrically perfect layout of the site made the vegetable garden look smart.

The vegetable garden did not only supply fresh herbs, vegetables and fruit for royal persons meals. The assortment of the garden also served the purpose of educating guests. In the Petrine epoch they grew potatoes, artichokes, lettuce, asparagus among others, which were quite unusual at that time. When arranging the restoration, which was his «favourite vegetable garden», Peter the Great paid special attention to planting trees, which were brought from all over Russia and overseas, and placed emphasis on the variety of fruit trees, berry shrubs, and vegetables. He ordered not only the well-known plants of old Moscow gardens of his childhood, but also the «novelties» that had impressed him when he was travelling around Europe. Peter the Great was particularly fond of fragrant herbs such as rue, hyssop, peppermint, tansy.

Today in «the Red Garden» there are vegetable, medicinal and decorative plants that, as the historic evidence suggests, have been grown in the restoration since the Petrine epoch.