From 7 August 2020, the State Hermitage is resuming guided tours of the Main Museum Complex and General Staff building for groups (of no more than 5 persons).
Electronic tickets for the guided tours can be purchase on the museum website by choosing the “Guided Tours” option in the “Tickets” section.
A guided tour of the Main Museum Complex will acquaint visitors with the Winter Palace and its state rooms, and also with the museum’s collections on show in the Small, Large and New Hermitages. Together with their guide, ticket-holders will ascend the grand Jordan Staircase, pass through the suite of dazzling palace state rooms, through the Pavilion Hall of the Small Hermitage, home to the famous Peacock Clock, and the picture gallery, where the works of great artists of the Italian Renaissance are on display.
The tour allows you to see outstanding works by 17th-century European artists and the legacy of Classical Antiquity presented in the New Hermitage, a building created specially for the Imperia Museum in the 19th century. The tour ends in the hall that contains the mysterious, intriguing artefacts of Ancient Egypt. After the visit, the group will leave the museum through the Commandant’s Entrance.
Guided tours of the Main Museum Complex take place daily from Tuesday to Sunday with time slots starting every half an hour.
Time slots: 12 noon, 12.30 pm, 1 pm, 1.30 pm, 2 pm, 4 pm, 4.30 pm, 5 pm, 5.30 pm, 6 pm, 6.30 pm, 7 pm
Duration of visit: 2 hours
Electronic guided tour tickets can be purchased through the museum website.
We recommend arriving at the meeting point for tour groups 15 minutes before the start of the tour.
Access to the Main Museum Complex for the holders of tickets for guided tours is through the Commandant’s Entrance of the Winter Palace from Palace Square.
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A guided tour of the General Staff reveals chapters in the history of the building whose eastern wing before the revolution housed civilian ministries of the Russian Empire. Since the end of the 20th century, it has been a part of the State Hermitage. The General Staff is a unique combination of a modern display complex and grand historical interiors.
You will get acquainted with one of the world’s finest collections of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings, visit the luxurious 27-room apartments of the Foreign Minister of the Russian Empire Count Nesselrode, where works of Russian and French exponents of the Empire style are displayed in an appropriate historical setting. You will see diplomatic gifts presented to the Russian imperial court, and also the largest collection of 19th-century German paintings outside of Germany itself.
Guided tours of the General Staff building operate for groups of up to 5 persons daily from Tuesday to Sunday with time slots starting at 12 noon, 1 pm, 2 pm, 4 pm, 5 pm and 7 pm.
Duration of visit: 2 hours
Electronic guided tour tickets for the General Staff building can be purchased through the museum website.
Access to the General Staff building for the holders of tickets for guided tours is through the entrance from Palace Square closest to Choristers’ (Pevchesky) Bridge.
We recommend arriving at the meeting point from tour groups 15 minutes before the start of the tour.
