Amber Room
What was the Amber Room?
Who first commissioned the Amber Room?
What happened to the Amber Room?
How was the Amber Room reconstructed?
What theories exist about the Amber Room’s disappearance?
Amber Room, a lavishly decorated chamber of the Catherine Palace in Tsarskoye Selo (now Pushkin), Russia, installed there in 1755. It was initially crafted for Prussian King Frederick I’s chamber at the Charlottenburg Palace in Berlin. Symbolizing an alliance between Prussia and Russia against Sweden in 1716, the room contained ornate panels formed from nearly six tons of amber—a prized Prussian resource—as well as other furnishings covered with precious stones. During World War II, Nazi armed forces dismantled and looted the original Amber Room, and its whereabouts were lost in the aftermath of the war. In 2003 the Tsarskoye Selo State Museum revealed a faithful reconstruction of the room within Catherine Palace for public viewing.
The original Amber Room
Commission and construction in Prussia (1701–16)
Frederick I, the first king of Prussia, initially commissioned the Amber Room for the Charlottenburg Palace in Berlin after his ascension in 1701. Court architect and sculptor Andreas Schlüter designed the room, and Danish craftsman Gottfried Wolfram executed the plans. However, the politics of the court led to their dismissal, and they were replaced by Swedish architect Johann Friedrich Eosander von Gӧthe and Danzig (now Gdańsk) artists Ernst Schacht and Gottfried Turau. Amber was extracted from the coasts of the Baltic Sea and then sculpted, backed with bronze leaf, and placed onto wood panels using adhesive. During construction, the panels and surrounding designs were temporarily set up in a room within the Berlin City Palace, though the Amber Room was never completed or installed there as a finished interior.
Transfer to Russia and early installations (1716–55)
In 1716 Prussian King Frederick William I, the son and successor of Frederick I, offered the yet-to-be-finished Amber Room to Russian Tsar Peter I in return for soldiers to combat Swedish control over some parts of the Baltic coast. The exchange solidified the diplomatic pact between the two states against Sweden. Crated and shipped to St. Petersburg, the room remained incomplete for 30 years. Construction was completed when craftsmen altered and installed the panels in the third Winter Palace under Empress Elizabeth’s orders. It was not until 1755 that Elizabeth had the Amber Room moved to the Catherine Palace at Tsarskoye Selo, where it would remain until World War II.
" height="20" alt="HEW Logo">
Expansion and completion at the Catherine Palace (1755–80)
In the Catherine Palace the room took on an expanded form, as envisioned by Baroque architect and designer Bartolomeo Francesco Rastrelli. The chamber selected for its installation was substantially larger than its earlier settings—nearly three times the size of the original Prussian cabinet room and taller than the space previously used at the Winter Palace. Rastrelli needed to adapt the existing amber panels to be featured on a much greater wall surface. He introduced more mirrored pilasters (rectangular columns) and a richly gilded cornice (a projecting decorative molding at the top of a wall). Painted imitation amber panels were added above the cornice to extend the visual effect of amber across the expanded wall surface. In 1763 Catherine the Great ordered eight new amber panels to complete an ambitious renovation. Old Berlin-made pieces were incorporated into fresh amber work, and by 1770 the Amber Room was some 180 square feet (17 square meters) and boasted six tons of amber. The space also contained amber-coated furniture, Florentine mosaics showcasing the five human senses, and a parquet floor made of more than a dozen wood varieties. Save for restoration work, the room’s design thereafter remained unchanged.
The room served various purposes for the Russian imperial family: Elizabeth meditated within its jeweled walls; Catherine the Great hosted gatherings; and Alexander II used it as a showroom. Following the dissolution of the Russian monarchy in 1917, the Catherine Palace was converted into a Soviet state museum, and the Amber Room became known as “the Eighth Wonder of the World.”
Nazi capture
In 1941 reports of Nazi forces advancing through the Soviet Union during Operation Barbarossa reached Pushkin. Anatoly Kuchumov, chief curator of the Catherine Palace, attempted to remove the amber panels from the museum to safeguard against their capture. However, the fragile and friable nature of aged amber likely posed a significant challenge to its removal. Fearing damage, Kuchumov’s team covered the Amber Room in wallpaper to hide it from looting soldiers while packing and removing furniture and other decorations from the room.
In the Kümmel Report, Nazi art historians had compiled a list of cultural objects associated with Germany—including the Amber Room—that they hoped to attain during their invasions and bring back to their museums. Nazi forces were thereby primed to search for the room upon arrival at the Catherine Palace, and they quickly uncovered the curator’s attempt to disguise it. The room, it is said, was dismantled in a matter of hours, crated in 27 containers, and shipped to Königsberg (now Kaliningrad). It was installed in Königsberg Castle.
The trusted destination for professionals, college students, and lifelong learners.
SUBSCRIBE
Roughly two years later, the Nazis disassembled the room in preparation for their retreat. As it was being crated, Allied bombs began to fall over Königsberg. Eventually, extensive bombing and the Soviet army reduced the Königsberg Castle to ruins, and the original Amber Room was never recovered.
Reconstruction (1979–2003)
- Wartime destruction: Many historians believe that the Amber Room was destroyed during the final months of World War II, either through combat damage or fires following the Soviet capture of Königsberg Castle.
- Hidden survival theories: Other accounts suggest that parts of the room may have been concealed in shipwrecks or underground sites by retreating German forces.
- Later legend: Popular narratives include the so-called “Amber Room curse,” which attributes misfortune or early deaths to some individuals involved in the search for the lost panels.
In 1979 the Soviet government shifted efforts from searching for the lost room to funding an elaborate reconstruction at the site of the original. The reconstruction was guided by a limited body of surviving visual and material evidence:
- Black-and-white photographs taken for a planned prewar restoration provided essential evidence for the layout, decorative details, and tonal contrasts of the original room.
- A color slide showing a corner of the room, including mosaics, mirrored pilasters, gilding, and amber panels, served as a key reference for the original color scheme.
- Fragments recovered from the destroyed room supplied information on the thickness, hues, and workmanship of the amber elements.
- A small amber chest surviving from the Catherine Palace collection, bearing the signature of Gottfried Turau, allowed close study of original construction techniques.
- One of the Florentine mosaic panels, corresponding to the senses of touch and smell, was recovered in Germany in 1997 and returned to Russia.
- Anatoly Kuchumov, curator of the Amber Room from 1916 to 1941, contributed firsthand knowledge that informed planning and reconstruction decisions.
The Soviet state controlled the Baltic amber mines, thus guaranteeing the necessary amber for the project. The reconstruction initially cost the Soviet government just under $8 million, but after the collapse of the U.S.S.R. in 1991, the project was largely suspended, bereft of funding. Ruhrgas, a German energy company that relied on Russian imports, donated $3.5 million in 1999 to complete the reconstruction. Finally, in 2003, during the 300th anniversary of St. Petersburg, the new Amber Room was unveiled to the public by Russian Pres. Vladimir Putin, German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, and many other heads of state.