1520 postcards.
5 albums
The largest collection of Richard publishing company in the world.
During the reign of Nicholas II, the Russian Empire was experiencing an unprecedented rise in entrepreneurship. The economic policy of the government fostered the development of large industrial capital as well as small enterprises and private initiatives. Saint Petersburg, as the capital of Russia, was affected by this trend the most. However, central streets in other large cities were peppered with multicoloured advertisements inviting potential customers to various shops and offering all kinds of services. The main avenue of the empire - Nevsky Prospekt – was a prestigious location for businesses and therefore very attractive for businessmen. Opening a shop in the vicinity of Nevsky Prospekt was the key to success as everyone went there to do their shopping. Despite the emergence of personal automobiles and public transport, customers found it easier to shop in stores that were located next to each other, thus saving time. Nevsky Prospekt boasted a large number of banks, trade offices and agencies, shops, photographic studios, churches of almost all Christian confessions (the proximity of churches was quite important for the owners of shops and offices as their businesses could be visited by members of congregations), restaurants, theaters and museums. The stretch of Nevsky Prospekt from the Admiralty to the Fontanka river, which was an ancient border of the city, was especially lively. It was this part of the avenue that hosted a catholic Cathedral of St. Catherine, built upon the project of a French architect Jean-Baptiste Vallin de la Mothe almost opposite Gostiny Dvor. There are two adjacent residential wings facing Nevsky Prospekt. A the end of the 19th century the majority of premises in these buildings were rented out to various businessmen and companies, among them jewelry shops, a bank branch, a pharmacy and Musical and Vocal Drama Courses. Another company hosted in this building was a warehouse of artificial flowers, greenery and flower accessories belonging to an ethnic German Richard Richardovich Luttermann. On the whole, Petersburg Germans were a special caste of capital dwellers, an insular and slightly isolated society where German language was spoken and business conducted with fellow Germans. R. R. Luttermann was one of such Germans; his correspondence was conducted in his native German tongue. His characteristic carefulness and thoroughness in business allowed him to achieve success in his enterprise. While he was decorating photography exhibitions with artificial flowers, as was the fashion during the Art Nouveau period, he was inspired by a brilliant idea of publishing postcards. Having met several landscape artists and print shop owners (also German), R. R. Luttermann established his own publishing business adjacent to his shop, which first engaged in publishing landscape postcards, but soon started publishing open letters with various themes. R. R. Luttermann published postcards with views of Petersburg and the province, postcards devoted to the Russian-Japanese war, the navy, and treasures of Russian museums. In the second half of the 1900s he turned to postcards based on paintings by contemporary artists, mostly from Petersburg but also foreign ones, whose works were popular among the public.
This great collection will be of interest to postcard collectors, those who are interested in the history of Petersburg, Russia and art connoisseurs.
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