The story of St. Catherine's Church

In 1764 Empress Catherine the Great passed through Pärnu, and after her visit she ordered a church to be built here, at her command and at her expense. It replaced a wooden church built in 1752 for the Pärnu garrison. The new church went up between 1764 and 1768 to designs by the architect Pyotr Yegorov and was consecrated in 1769. Because it was built about a century earlier than most other Orthodox churches, its architecture is different, and it became a source of inspiration for later Orthodox church building in the Baltic states.

Look up at its baroque silhouette: a large central dome with a lantern, four smaller turrets and a western tower with a needle-pointed spire, six towers in all. The facade is richly decorated and divided by pediments and cornices. Inside, the iconostasis, also by Yegorov, deserves your attention.

The church stands on the corner of Vee and Uus streets.