Location : ARMENIAN CHURCH OF ST. CATHERINE
Saint Petersburg.
The first Armenians appeared in St. Petersburg almost immediately after the foundation of the city. In 1710, they created their own community. At this time, they gathered in private homes. The first request for the construction of an Armenian church from Archimandrite Minas was filed in 1714, but was rejected by the authorities. Only on September 25, 1725, the metropolitan community, numbering 30 yards, received the consent of the Synod to open a prayer house in a wooden building on the 3rd line of Vasilyevsky Island. In January 1740, Luka Shirvanov (GukasShirvanian) received permission to build “a small Armenian stone church dependent.” But after the death of Anna Ivanovna, construction stopped. In accordance with the manifesto, published in July 1763, on the free observance of church rites by all the peoples who settled in Russia,
On May 22, 1770, according to the petition of the head of the Armenian community, I. L. Lazarev (Hovhannes Lazaryan), “with the rest of the Armenians”, an oral order was issued by Catherine II “to allow them to build a church in St. Petersburg”
The work was carried out according to the project of J. M. Felten quite quickly and already in 1772 the church was consecrated. Its construction cost 33 thousand rubles. I.L. Lazarev personally donated 30 thousand rubles for the construction of the temple, for which the church was built in accordance with the ceremonial splendor of the center of the capital. For such a service, the community allowed him to build his own house on the church ground on the south side in a line with the development of the avenue (Nevsky pr., 42). The residential building, designed by Felten, cost Lazarev 50,000 rubles. The construction of the northern wing was carried out a decade later. Having built the buildings entirely with his own money, Lazarev thereby strengthened the authority of the most influential person in the Armenian community
On February 18, 1780, the Armenian archbishop Joseph (Argutinsky), with the participation of eight priests and in the presence of Prince G.A. Potemkin-Tauride, consecrated the church in the name of the Great Martyr Catherine, the heavenly patroness of the Empress. The church became the center of Armenian culture in St. Petersburg: a printing house and a national school, which has been functioning to this day, were opened with it.