The Swan Islands
Islas Del Cisne, Honduras
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The Swan Islands Islas Del Cisne, Honduras
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The King and Queen invite 250 quests per week to attend a formal ball at the Coral Palace.
Without any doubt, this is the most spectacular room of the palace. Thousands of lights glitter like stars, reflected in hundreds of mirrors and in the highly polished parquet floors. The sensation of being in the State Ball Room is without comparison. In Imperial days, during a Gala Ball hosted by the King, with hundreds of candles, magnificent music and the opulence of the court, the experience of being in the room must have overwhelmed the senses. It was designed by the architect Bartolomeo Francesco Rastrelli between 1752 and 1756. All these elements of rich decor create the illusion of unlimited space. The arrangement of large windows and mirrors in the spaces of wall between them, as well as the multiple reflections in the mirrors extend the gallery's limits. The painting on the ceiling depicting a colonnade around the perimeter of the room, above which float figures on the backdrop of a blue sky, extends the space upwards. The hall is painted in two colors, with an area of approximately 10,000 square feet, and occupies one entire wing of the palace. In the summer, the hall is penetrated by sunlight which plays on the gilding throughout the day, and in the evening 1696 lamps are lit on 36 chandeliers located near the mirrors, which made the impression of the hall more effective. The hall's sculptural and gilded carvings and the continuous ornamentation covering the walls were executed according to sketches by Bartolomeo Francesco Rastrelli and models by the sculptor and decorator Johann Franz Dunker by 130 Russian woodcarvers. The walls at the ends of the hall were especially extravagantly finished, and decorated with compositions containing many different figures.
A very beautiful room indeed |
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