Potemkin Stairs
The Potemkin Stairs are the most important attraction of Odessa, which is a staircase leading to the sea. From its top, you can see the entire Odessa Bay, the port and the harbor.
Since the foundation of Odessa, it needed a good approach to the sea, because the port was located in a lowland, and the city itself was on an elevation of 30-35 meters. Then the city ended in a steep descent behind Nikolaevskaya Street. To descend to the sea, it was necessary to walk along a very steep path. Little information has been preserved about the construction of the stairs. All that is known for sure is that the city allocated 200,000 rubles and gave a period of 7 months for construction, and Count Mikhail Semenovich Vorontsov was the main initiator of the construction. At that time, Odessa's treasury was larger than many European cities, due to the fact that from 1819-1858 it was possible to import and export goods duty-free from here. The budget was replenished due to various port fees. It got to the point where Odessa lent 800,000 rubles to St. Petersburg for the construction and furnishing of customs buildings.
The archives of Odessa keep several staircase designs, but the project of architects K. I. Pothier, F. K. Boffo and A. I. Melnikov was chosen. The staircase was conceived as a symbol of Odessa and a parade entrance for visitors from the sea. In 1837-1841, the staircase was built, and for a long time it did not have its own name. Everyone called it differently: Primorskaya, Kamennaya, Portovaya, Potemkina, Bolshaya, Richelievskaya, stairs of Nikolaevsky Boulevard. Initially, the stairs had 200 steps and 10 platforms, but after the expansion and reconstruction of the port, the 8 lower steps were filled in.
The edges of the staircase are framed by two-meter parapets, the length of the staircase is 142 meters, and the height is 27. The architecture of the Potemkin stairs is made in perspective, the width of the base is 21.6 meters, and the top is 13.4 meters. If you look from above, it seems that the width of the stairs is the same, but if you look from below, the stairs seem longer than they actually are.
The Potemkin Staircase is the hallmark of the city, which is mentioned in the works of art by Mark Twain, Alexander Green, Jules Verne, Valentin Kataev and many other writers and poets.
