Antonio Rinaldi (architect)

Antonio Rinaldi (Palermo, 25 August 1709 – Rome, 10 April 1794) was an Italian architect, trained by Luigi Vanvitelli, who worked mainly in Russia.

In 1751, during a trip to

(illustrated, right), where Rinaldi successfully expressed the domed, centrally-planned form required by traditional Russian Orthodox practice in a confident Italian Late Baroque vocabulary.

His first important secular commission was the Novoznamenka

designs: the Palace of Peter III (1758–60), the sumptuously decorated Chinese Palace (1762–68), and the Ice-Sliding Pavilion (1762–74).

In the 1770s, Rinaldi served as the main architect of

Catholic Church of St. Catherine

.

Rinaldi's last works represent a continuous transition from the dazzling

Prince Vladimir

and still standing.

In 1784, the old master resigned his posts on account of bad health and returned to Italy. He died in Rome in 1794.

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