First Stages of Wet Wooden Ice-House Conservation Dated to the First Half of the 18th Century

Abstract

In July 2019, during the restoration of the building of the First Cadet Corps (the former mansion of Aleksandr D. Menshikov), fragments of two structures that differ in the degree of preservation – a cellar and an ice-house (lednik), dating back to the first half of the 18th century, were discovered. The lednik is a traditional building for the North-Western region of Russia and a rare wooden architectural object for St. Petersburg of that time. In order to prepare the construction for dismantling and to plan its further restoration, preliminary studies were conducted. It was found that details from other wooden objects, probably ships and barges, were used for this construction. The physical parameters of the wood of the structural parts varied. Most parts of the lednik are waterlogged. Based on the results of the research, a plan was worked out for the preservation of this unique historical architectural object.

Keywords

• wet archaeological wood
• ice-house
• log cabin
• traditional construction
• dismantling
• conservation