Sheremetev Castle Yurino

The Sheremetev family began this in the 1870s and were still adding to it when the estate was taken in 1918, and the long build shows: red and black brick, stone dressings, towers, turrets, pointed windows, a glazed winter garden, and a mix of Gothic, Romanesque and Moorish detail applied without much attempt to reconcile them. Inside were around a hundred rooms, an Eastern room with Moorish plasterwork, a picture gallery and a collection that included work attributed to European masters. The collection was dispersed after 1918 and the building was used as a sanatorium and a rest home; a wing operates as a hotel now, so you can stay in it. Restoration has been intermittent and the state of rooms varies from finished to bare brick. It stands on the Volga bank in a village of a few thousand people, which is part of the effect - a large eclectic castle with almost nothing around it.

What you actually see

• The mixed styles - Gothic, Romanesque and Moorish detail on one long-built house.
• The Eastern room - Moorish plasterwork surviving inside.
• The setting - a castle on the Volga bank in a village of a few thousand.
• The winter garden - the glazed conservatory attached to the house.

When to go

May to September; river boats call in summer. Two to three hours. Access by road is long from any city.

Honest expectations

Restoration is unfinished and many rooms are empty or bare. The original collection is gone. Visits are usually guided in Russian only. Yurino is remote with limited food and transport, and the road approach is slow.

Nearby

The Volga runs below; Nizhny Novgorod is far upriver.