In October 1770, a worried Frederick the Great dispatched his younger brother to St. Petersburg. Prince Henry’s mission was to promote a partition of Poland and persuade Catherine to let Prussia broker a peace agreement with the Turks. But with her recent string of military victories, Catherine had no interest in ending the two-year war. Instead of talking peace, Russia’s empress threw a lavish party in Henry’s honor. Some 3,600 costumed guests filled twenty-one apartments of the Winter Palace.
Wine, vodka, and champagne were already flowing at nine P.M. when Catherine sashayed into the hall wearing a Grecian costume. Trumpets announced the arrival of Apollo, the four seasons, and months of the year played by children. “A great part of the company wore dominos, or capuchin dresses,” wrote William Richardson, tutor to the children of Britain’s ambassador, Lord Cathcart. “The Empress herself . . . wore a Grecian habit; though I was afterwards told that she varied her dress two or three times during the masquerade. . . . Several persons appeared in the dresses of different nations, Chinese, Turks, Persians and Armenians.”
When a Frenchman dressed as a parrot sounded off in Russian, French, and English, “. . . everybody laughed but Prince Henry, who stood beside the empress, and was so grave and so solemn, that he would have performed his part admirably in the shape of an owl,” added Richardson. “. . . At different intervals persons in various habits entered the hall and exhibited Cossack, Chinese, Polish, Swedish and Tatar dances. The whole was so gorgeous, and at the same time so fantastic, that I could not help thinking myself present at some of the magnificent festivals described in the old-fashioned romances.”1 Four orchestras performed during dinner from a large overhead gallery. After dinner, actors staged a tableau vivant. Though the official program ended at midnight, dancing continued until five in the morning.
Catherine wrote to Voltaire about the elaborate soiree, knowing he’d share her description with his influential friends: “At dinner-time, Apollo, the Four Seasons and the Twelve Months made their entry. . . . In a short speech, Apollo invited the company to proceed to the banqueting hall. The hall was oval, and contained twelve alcoves, in each of which a table was set for ten. Each alcove represented a month of the year, and the room was decorated accordingly.”2
Prince Henry’s fête was part of Catherine’s ambitious social calendar that featured receptions for rulers and ambassadors, balls and masquerades, and celebrations of family milestones, military victories, and peace treaties. Catherine staged these costly, choreographed productions to bolster the prestige of her court and empire. Catherine proved the consummate hostess, at once imposing and charming. “. . . [H]er majestic head and brow, proud look and dignified deportment made her seem taller than she was,” observed France’s envoy, the Count de Ségur, noting “her aquiline nose, well-shaped mouth, Saxe blue eyes beneath dark lashes, gentle glance and seductive smile.”3
Catherine was a stickler for etiquette and ceremony, requiring other monarchs to address her by the dual titles empress and tsarina. Like France’s Louis XIV, she received foreign diplomats while seated on a throne on a raised dais. Envoys had to address her in French, the official language of her court, and kiss her hand. Catherine’s own version of Louis XIV’s lever, or “arising,” featured morning meetings revolving around her toilette and breakfast, followed by elegant lunches and teas.
It was during Peter the Great’s reign that napkins first appeared on the imperial table—since men no longer had beards with which to wipe their mouths. The tsar’s culinary tastes were relatively modest. According to sculptor Andrey Nartov, “. . . His food consisted of cabbage soup, aspic, porridge, grilled [meat] with pickled cucumbers or lemons, corned beef, ham. He was particularly fond of Limburger cheese. All of the above was served by his chef Velten [father of Catherine’s architect, Yury Velten]. Of vodkas, Peter the Great preferred anisette. His usual drink was kvass. At dinner, he drank Hermitage wine (red wine from the northern Rhône) and sometimes Hungarian wine [sweet Tokaj].”4 Peter also popularized English stout, which he’d enjoyed during his visit in 1698.
Peter’s youngest daughter, Elizabeth, who enjoyed cross-dressing at her frequent parties, took banqueting to a whole new level. Design aesthetics were so important that her guests often found themselves sitting with their backs to one another. The arrival of imported spices, tea, and coffee led to new types of tableware. At a dinner for forty in 1746, tables were set with 1,300 plates and dishes, along with 300 bonbon pyramids. Exotic menu items ranged from fricassee of nightingale tongues and ragout of deer lips to stewed bear paws and “opened this morning bulls’ eyes” in sauce.
The ultimate in excess was the “Empress roast” which called for a lark stuffed with olives placed into a quail, the quail into a partridge, the partridge into a pheasant, pheasant into a capon, and capon into a suckling pig.5 Dessert took the form of model boats and buildings, along with trompe l’oeil designs for sweetmeats. On one occasion, Elizabeth sent a care package to Frederick the Great with her favorite dish—pasties with foie gras, or duck liver.
Privately, Catherine’s culinary tastes were more in line with Peter’s. According to historians, her favorite dishes were boiled beef with pickled cucumbers and sauce made of dried venison tongues, boiled chicken, roast leg of mutton or beef, hash duck, and stewed mushrooms. The empress reportedly fed table scraps to her pack of Italian greyhounds. Isabel de Madariaga describes how Catherine, an early riser, lit her own fire so as not to disturb her servants, and began work at five A.M., downing several cups of high-octane coffee.6
But understanding the propaganda value of luxurious dining, Catherine entertained frequently and lavishly, earning the moniker “Queen of Feasts.” Under her watch, 13 percent of Russia’s annual state budget went to the imperial court (versus 2 percent for education). It was not uncommon for Catherine’s banquets to feature over one hundred dishes and last hours, sometimes until after midnight.
At Catherine’s direction, her imperial chefs whipped up French-inspired delicacies like quail with truffles, pheasants with pistachio nuts, teal with olives, tortoise meat, and whole spit-roasted swans. Fresh oysters for 1,000 guests cost 300 times the annual wage of an average Russian worker. Pies with various fillings accompanied an array of soups. Menu items included stewed lamb with saffron, roast goose hare with noodles, edible offals and giblets, beef tongue, and lamb kidneys. At one imperial gala, Field Marshal Alexander Suvorov caused a panic in the palace kitchen when he ordered cabbage soup and groats.7
Typically, a master of ceremonies opened imperial galas with a grand polonaise, followed by waltzes, quadrilles, and a Russian folkdance. Afterwards, the host announced the names of the lucky guests who would sit with Catherine at the imperial dining table. During Elizabeth’s reign, dinners were served à la française, or French style. In unison, gentlemen of the table would lift platter covers for the entire meal. This made a dramatic impression, but resulted in cold, hard to reach food. To remedy this, Catherine introduced dining à la russe, in which each of her guests received an individual serving of separate courses. In between courses, the tables were cleared, cleaned, and reset.
With the hot dish came ceremonial toasts, pronounced standing, champagne glasses in hand. The most important toast was the health of the empress drunk to the accompaniment of trumpets, drums, and cannon fire. On rare occasions Catherine raised a toast to one of her guests, considered a great honor. Last but not least came dessert, from the French word desservir—to clear the table. Music, dancing, or other entertainment frequently accompanied this course, which featured mounds of richly decorated fruit, bonbons, pastries, and ices. Popular ice cream flavors included jasmine, chestnut, and violet. Catherine’s favorite, Kolomna pastila, was made of whipped fruit purée.
In addition to the fifty-two Sundays of the year that called for feasting, Russians celebrated sixty-three festivals—twenty-five of which were dedicated to Catherine and her family. Five of these holidays honored the empress: her birthday, April 21; her accession to the throne, June 28; her coronation, September 22; her smallpox inoculation, November 21; and her name day, November 24. Milestones in the lives of Catherine’s family members—like the birth of a grandchild, christenings, and name days—were also marked with banquets. Royal marriages, military victories, and visits by foreign dignitaries were opportunities for Catherine to advertise the magnificence of her court. Though rules for Lent and other religious fasts excluded meat, eggs, and dairy products, royal fare still managed to be incredibly rich with white sturgeon, salmon, and caviar with onions; and fish pies filled with mushrooms, peas, and berries.
Serving hundreds of dinner guests required a small army of waiters. Under the supervision of a count steward, court officers sporting German titles carried out specialized tasks. The kuchenmeister was the head chef, tafeldeckers set the tables, mundschenk (cup-bearers) poured alcoholic beverages, and kaffeeschenk served tea, coffee, and hot chocolate. Konditors and their assistants delivered dessert; table and crockery were the responsibility of buffet and kitchen officers.8 Traditionally, leftovers were shared among the staff. Catherine and her family members sometimes left sweets behind as a tip. Food was also known to disappear from the imperial kitchen. On one occasion while strolling through her garden, Catherine spotted her staff carrying porcelain piled with peaches, pineapples, and grapes. “They might at least have left me the dishes,” she joked.9
Inspired by their empress, Russian aristocrats also hired French chefs. Gregory Orlov and Catherine’s advisers Prince Nikolay Repnin and Count Ivan Osterman impressed their guests with dishes like “sterlets an arshin, perch from their own pools; asparagus nearly as thick as a cudgel from their own gardens, veal as white as snow from calves nursed in their own cattle yard. Peaches and pineapples also came from their own hothouses; even tasty wine made of berries, something like champagne, was of their own production.”10
To complement the elaborate cuisine, party planners decorated the Winter Palace to the nines. The sensory experience included cascading fountains, canaries in gilded cages, and staterooms scented with flowers, citrus trees, and perfume burners. Beneath candlelit chandeliers, gold and silver cutlery gleamed and crystal stemware sparkled. At feasts and holidays, the finest Parisian silver graced the tables, often decorated with symbols of the state and the Romanovs. “Silver was the currency of the time, and imperial silver services were akin to putting the state treasury on the table,” writes Wolfram Koeppe. Catherine, “one of the most astute patrons of silver services,” used them “as propagandistic displays of might.”11
Right after her coup, Catherine consolidated the Romanov silver, ordering the most valuable objects from the numerous imperial residences transferred to the Winter Palace. Among the luxe items were silver and gold works by Johann Friedrich Köpping, son of Swedish silversmith Claus Jacob Köpping, who’d moved to St. Petersburg during Peter the Great’s reign. Among Johann Friedrich’s most striking pieces were ten four-branch candelabra, part of a large service he’d created for Elizabeth, along with the Petrovsky Silver Service, a gift from the tsarina to her nephew Peter. After naming Köpping “Court Keeper of Plate,” Catherine had him augment the exceptional rococo “Parisian Service” designed for Elizabeth in 1761 by François-Thomas Germain, France’s royal goldsmith. Catherine used this service for the most important state occasions.
Catherine amassed “silver products with the same passion that she applied to other art works,” ordering fifty services during her reign, writes Marina Lopato, curator of European silver at the Hermitage.12 Not wanting to rough it while on the road, Catherine commissioned Köpping to produce her First and Second Traveling Services. In 1763, members of the Preobrazhensky Guard regiment accompanied the delivery of imperial silver to Köpping’s workshop for the First Service. To make sure that none of the precious metal disappeared, a lieutenant, sergeant, and six soldiers stayed throughout the commission.
During the reigns of Louis XIV and his grandson Louis XV, French luxury brands enjoyed a heyday. Among the ultimate status symbol was a dinner service by one of Paris’s renowned silversmiths. Describing herself as “avid” for French culture and art, Catherine enlisted sculptor Étienne-Maurice Falconet to procure a service “made in the latest fashion” in Paris. “I hear you have some designs for a silver service,” Catherine wrote Falconet in early 1770. “. . . I should like to see them if you will show them to me, for I have a mind to order one for sixty people.”13
The result of this “fantasy” as Catherine called it, was one of the largest orders of French silver ever produced—3,000 pieces from Jacques Roettiers and his son Jacques-Nicolas Roettiers. Members of a distinguished family that had served the French court as medalists and engravers since the 17th century, Roettiers occupied a prestigious location at the Louvre. But the goldsmiths’ terms were excessive even for Russia’s extravagant empress. In today’s currency, the price tag was over $4.3 million, or an average of $1,440 per piece.
“I understand nothing of this way of reckoning,” Catherine complained to Falconet. “They want 25,000 livres a month, and a year and a half of work makes, for eighteen months, 450,000 livres, which, I believe, is nearly 100,000 rubles . . . you will have the kindness to explain to these gentlemen, briefly and clearly, how many pieces there will be, what they charge for the silver and what for the work; then we will see if it pleases us to continue.”14 In May, Falconet assured Catherine that Roettiers’ designs represented the best. “I believe these approach more nearly than the others good taste in silversmithing.”15
The following month, Catherine signed the contract for the lavish service, marking the designs she approved, and authorizing monthly installments. The pieces were to be made of the usual standard of silver, slightly higher than sterling. They were also to be marked; the prestige of Parisian silver was so great that marks themselves had become a fashion statement. Catherine weighed in on the smallest design details while Falconet advised on stylistic matters. For the table service, tea service, and coffee service, Roettiers drew on an enormous repertoire of decorative motifs—laurel swags, guilloche and Vitruvian scroll borders, oyster shells, and rosettes.
With the average silver service numbering 200 to 250 items, Catherine’s 3,000-piece order was unprecedented. To put the commission into perspective, Count Heinrich von Brühl’s extravagant porcelain Swan Service numbered 2,200 pieces. While executing Catherine’s order, Roettiers was busy making gold rings for the wedding of the future Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, refashioning a toilet service for the bride, and supplying silver objects for engagement gifts. To help complete Catherine’s service, Roettiers called in reinforcements from four rival goldsmiths.
Between 1771 and 1773, six shipments containing 2,630 items arrived at the Winter Palace; a final shipment brought the total to 3,000 pieces. Besides the 576 dinner plates and 128 hors d’oeuvres, second course, serving, and dessert plates, there were 40 coffeepots, 16 chocolate pots, and 8 covered pot à oille—a special tureen for serving meat stew. Originally introduced from Spain, the soupy stew had become a standard part of French dining by the mid 18th century. Each tureen sported four scrolling legs, a frieze of laurel leaves and berries, and laurel wreath–shaped handles. Though Catherine was pleased with the glamorous service, she complained to Falconet about “two candelabra that are not beautifully designed. These pieces have confirmed my opinion that human figures should never be used for soup!”16
Before the Marquis de Juigné left his post as ambassador in St. Petersburg in 1779, Catherine snagged all the tableware from the French embassy. The same year, she ordered a gold coffee service for her two-year-old grandson, Alexander. Also around this time, through Melchior Grimm, Catherine requested designs for a solid gold service from Robert-Joseph Auguste, one of the first Parisian goldsmiths to work in the neoclassical style. “The execution of such a service was a thing so capital and so unique that, if Your Majesty deigned entrust him with it, he would leave and close his workshop, would devote himself entirely to a work of this importance, would make the journey to Russia if necessary,” wrote Grimm.
But Catherine was unimpressed. “These designs are exactly what I do not want: they are filled with animal figures and human figures and ornaments that are seen everywhere, and all this prompted me to order that they be sent back,” she told Grimm. “Moreover, Monsieur Auguste is frightfully expensive; I fear that he will charge as much for the workmanship as he will for the weight; I bid him adieu.”17 Catherine eventually changed her mind, placing a huge order with Auguste and his assistant Louis-Joseph Lenhendrick for several silver services for her Yekaterinoslav, Kazan, and Nizhny Novgorod residences. Though each service had different decoration, each was engraved with Russia’s double-headed eagle.
Catherine also turned the tables at court with luxurious porcelain services. Production of “white gold” Meissen in Saxony had unleashed enormous demand for the luxurious ceramic invented centuries before in China. Earlier in the century, German antiquarian Johann Joachim Winckelmann had criticized porcelain as being “in childish taste” used for “idiotic puppets” on dessert tables.18 But as aesthetic taste shifted from the playful rococo to the more serious neoclassical style, porcelain became more refined. Catherine’s porcelain services weren’t just beautiful. Every teacup and sauceboat served as reminders to guests of the power and sophistication of their hostess. Political motifs and decorations advertised Russia’s growing wealth and power. Adorned with landscapes, mythological scenes, initials, or poems, tureens and plates inspired dinner conversation. Catherine kept the most valuable porcelain close by in the imperial private apartments and Hermitage in specially made boxes that could be moved in case of fire.
One porcelain service went on permanent display. In 1772, to commemorate Russia’s victory over the Turks, Frederick the Great presented Catherine with the Berlin Dessert Service. Scenes from the Russo-Turkish War adorned all 120 dessert plates and Catherine’s cipher “C” appeared four times in the openwork borders of palm leaves. Berlin’s Royal Porcelain Factory created new molds for the melon-shaped tureens, gilded baskets covered in porcelain grape leaves, and leaf-shaped trays. A thematic porcelain sculpture (surtout de table) starring Catherine replaced the traditional sugary table centerpiece known as pastillage. Using Vigilius Eriksen’s state portrait, Berlin modelers produced the statuette of the empress enthroned beneath a canopy. Surrounding her are female figures personifying the arts and figurines of Russia’s ethnic groups, captured Turks, and military trophies.
Catherine kept Russia’s own porcelain factories busy filling royal orders. In 1765, she’d reorganized St. Petersburg’s Imperial Porcelain Factory founded two decades earlier by Elizabeth. The following year, English entrepreneur Francis Gardner launched Russia’s first private porcelain factory. In 1777, Catherine commissioned the first of four large “order services” from the Gardner Factory, sending pieces from the Berlin Dessert Service as models. Being knighted was a great military honor—similar to receiving America’s Congressional Medal of Honor. Each year, knights of Russia’s elite imperial orders commemorated their patron saints’ feast days at a Winter Palace reception featuring prayers, toasts, and cannon fire from the Peter and Paul Fortress. Gardner’s factory decorated the colorful porcelain services with the ribbons, stars and badges worn by members of each order—St. George, St. Andrew, St. Alexander Nevsky, and St. Vladimir.
Catherine’s phenomenal entertaining achieved the desired effect. Count de Ségur summed up the impact: “The court of Catherine was the meeting place of all European monarchs and celebrities of her age. Before her reign Petersburg, built in the realm of cold and ice, went almost unnoticed and seemed to be somewhere in Asia. During her reign Russia became a European power. St. Petersburg occupied an important place among the capitals of the educated world and the Russian throne was raised as high as the most powerful and significant thrones.”19
Like their fashionable empress, Russia’s elite set their tables with the finest European silver and porcelain for the first time, and the rest of the continent could not help but take notice. Centuries before trendsetting Kate Middleton, the Catherine the Great Effect was in full swing.