Kaliningrad Amber Museum

The Kaliningrad Amber Museum is a museum located in the Russian city of Kaliningrad devoted to housing and displaying amber artworks. It is located in the city center, on the shore of Lake Verkhneye. Construction on the museum began in 1972. The museum opened in 1979 and houses about 14,000 individual pieces. The museum occupies part of a reconstructed fortification, originally built by Karl Friedrich Emil zu Dohna-Schlobitten in the Napoleonic wars.Among the exhibits are the world's second-largest piece of amber and a 4ft vase named The Abundance, as well as a collection of over 3,000 amber inclusions. One of the most famous organic inclusions is a small lizard.HistoryThe amber museum was established in Kaliningrad because near the town of Yantarnoye there is the largest (out of the discovered) deposit of the Baltic gem - more than 90% of the world's reserves.For ten years since 1969 the process of restoration of the historical and architectural complex was under way. The first stage of the Amber Museum was opened on December 29, 1979 as a branch of the Kaliningrad Regional Historical and Art MuseumGalleriesThe exposition is arranged on three floors in 28 show-rooms, with a total area of 1,000 square meters. It contains five sections: Origin of amber, its properties Historical and archaeological knowledge of amber Amber in art of the 17th to 18th centuries Kaliningrad Amber Factory Amber in contemporary art A part of the exhibition is dedicated the "Staatliche Bernstein-Manufaktur Koenigsberg" (amber factory Koenigsberg), a German company for extraction and treatment amber in Koenigsberg (now Kaliningrad) and Palmnicken (today Jantarny) until 1945.

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