French Gothic architecture
The most famous examples of Gothic architecture are found in the Île-de-France and Champagne, but other French regions created their own original versions of the style. The Angevin Gothic style in the province of Anjou features a vaults with elegant decorative ribs, as well as very ornate columns. The style is found in the interior of Angers Cathedral (1032–1523), though many of the Gothic elements of the facade were replaced with Renaissance elements and towers. A very fine example of Angevin Gothic is found in the medieval Saint Jean Hospital in Angers, which now contains the Musée Jean-Lurçat, a museum of contemporary tapestries.
Gothic architecture
Though Russia had no tradition of Gothic architecture, The Empress Catherine the Great chose the style in Tsaritsyno Palace, a large palace complex she constructed south of Moscow from 1776 until her death in 1796. Later, Czar Nicholas I of Russia commissioned the German romantic writer and painter Karl Friedrich Schinkel to design a Gothic chapel for his park at Peterhof Palace near St. Petersburg. It was completed in 1834.