The General Staff Building was constructed in 1829.

Before the Revolution of 1917 the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs resided in the East Wing, the General Staff and military offices resided in the West Wing.

In 1993 the East Wing passed to the State Hermitage Museum for its needs.Works on adaptation for the museum use that started in 2008 urged the need of a large-scale restoration and reconstruction.

Our specialists in geotechnics were tackling the following tasks:

• to carry out underpinning and restoration of the foundations;
• to increase the effective area by lowering the basement floor level;
• to increase the in-yard area by embedding to the ground.

As the result of the performed works the following projects were carried out:

• inspection of the structures and utility systems;
• engineer and geological investigation;
• the underpinning of the existing foundations by cementing method;
• the underpinning of the foundation/soil contact area;
• the underpinning by means of root piles;
• the embedding of the inner yards up to 5 meters depth by the retaining structures of tangent piles;
• construction of the pile foundations in the yards and cast-in-situ structures in the basement floor: foundation slab, walls, columns;
• lowering the floor level of the basement premises along the whole building;
• caisson type waterproofing;
• exterior membrane waterproofing and underpinning of the adjoining structures of the existing brick walls.

Customer: Saint Petersburg Fund for Construction Investment Projects

General Contractor: INTARSIA Group of Companies

Implementation: 2008 – 2013