Catherinethal ("Catherine's valley") is a Petrine Baroque palace of Catherine I of Russia in Tallinn. It was built after the Great Northern War to Nicola Michetti's designs by Gaetano Chiaveri and Mikhail Zemtsov. In the 20th century the Estonian version of the name, Kadriorg, gained currency and came to be applied to the surrounding district.
After the successful siege of Reval in 1710 Peter the Great of Russia bought a Dutch-style manor house at Lasnamäe for his wife Catherine. The house today is the result of a drastic renovation ordered by Nicholas I of Russia in 1827.
The new palace was started on 25 July 1718. Peter and Catherine visited the unfinished residence on several occasions, but after the emperor's death in 1725 Catherine showed no interest in the seaside property. The great hall with Catherine's initials and profuse stucco decor (attributed to Heinrich von Bergen) survives, but many other interiors have been altered. The gardener Ilya Surmin was responsible for the flower garden with two fountains and the so-called mirage garden on several levels. The layout of the park shares similarities with that of Strelna.
The palace currently houses an art gallery. The KUMU Museum is sited in the park.
The Beckov castle stands on a steep 50 m tall rock in the village Beckov. The dominance of the rock and impression of invincibility it gaves, challenged our ancestors to make use of these assets. The result is a remarkable harmony between the natural setting and architecture.
The castle first mentioned in 1200 was originally owned by the King and later, at the end of the 13th century it fell in hands of Matúš Èák. Its owners alternated - at the end of the 14th century the family of Stibor of Stiborice bought it.
The next owners, the Bánffys who adapted the Gothic castle to the Renaissance residence, improved its fortifications preventing the Turks from conquering it at the end of the 16th century. When Bánffys died out, the castle was owned by several noble families. It fell in decay after fire in 1729.
The history of the castle is the subject of different legends.