Peterhof closes fountain season with tradition Autumn Compliment festival

The Autumn Compliment music festival will wind up another season in Russia’s "capital of fountains" Peterhof, one of St.Petersburg’s suburban estates. The fountains will be closed until spring. However, the museums in Peterhof, Oranienbaum and Strelna will continue to work and receive visitors, the press service of the museum told TASS. "On Sunday evening, the Peterhof anthem will be played, and to this solemn music the fountains will be turned off until next spring," head of the museum’s press service Valeria Karpovich said. The Autumn Compliment festival will be held in Peterhof for the fifth time. The fountains will be turned off by two groups comprising 29 specialists. It takes from 30 seconds to 3 minutes to shut off a fountain, depending on the complexity of the design. The Peterhof fountain system is one of the largest in the world. It includes 147 fountains in the Upper Garden and the Lower Park of the former Russian imperial residence founded by Tsar Peter the Great in 1710. Peterhof’s fountains were modeled on the fountains of the French Versailles, but they surpass them by the abundance of water, the height of water jets and the duration of operation. Most of the fountains and cascades were designed by Peter the Great himself. Peterhof is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Russia. It is visited by about 5 million people annually. According to the museum's press service, a record number of visitors during the 2015 season was registered on June 13 when 57,000 people came to Peterhof.