The exhibition of the museum illustrates everyday life and culture of more than 150 peoples of Russia in XIX-ее centuries. The collection of the museum numbers over a half a million of exhibits. In the Golden Room one can see ornaments, armory, cult objects made of gold and silver and decorated with precious stones. The Russian Ethnographical museum was founded in 1895 as a department of the Russian State Museum. In 1934 it was reorganised into a separate scientific and cultural center - the State Museum of Ethnography of Peoples of the USSR and later on into The Russian Ethnographical Museum. The building of the Museum was constructed after the project by V.F. Swinjin in 1902 - 1913 for the exhibition of ethnographical collections. The facade is decorated with a sculptural group with Athene - the goddess of wisdom, the patron of arts and crafts - in the center. The Avant-hall and the Marble hall, situated in the main part of the building, are one of the best palace interiors of Saint-Petersburg. The museum is under reconstruction at the moment.