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The first project and final solution After the defeat of Napoleon in 1812, Alexander I signed an edict ordering that there be a contest among architects to design a cathedral commemorating the great victory of the Russian people and the people's gratitude to God for the preservation of Russia. The plan of architect Witberg fully satisfied the Tsar's intention. According to plan a huge three-storied church, with a great dome and a colonnade, was to have been erected in the Sparrow Hills district and the entire mass was to have been effectively laid out in the form of an amphitheater along the slope of the hill. But grand as this project seemed in theory, it turned out to be quite impossible to carry out in practice. The sandy, unfirm ground of the Sparrow Hills could not support such a colossal edifice, and it was therefore necessary to change the project itself and find another site for its construction. Both were done during the reign of Nicholas I, who energetically took up his deseased brother's great idea. The well-known architect A.K.Ton was delegated to compose a project and a new construction site was chosen on the territory of the former Alexeevsky Convent, where the solemn laying of the corner-stone took place on September 10, 1839.
In 1858 the exterior was fully completed, the scaffolding taken down, and the church stood in all its grandeur, striking for the utter enormity of its size. Suffice it to say that the height of the nave was well over 330 feet, and its area nearly 73,500 square feet. The church was based on a square plan, having a portal, or extension, on each of its sides so as to give the building the plan of a Greek cross. Thirty six columns supported the cornice, on which were arranged twenty semicircular arches. The walls both inside and out were faced almost exclusively with Russia stone: dark green labrador and dark red porphyry, on a background of whitish marble from the village of Protopopovo near Moscow. The church was surmounted by five gilded domes, of which the great central one was 315 feet in circumference. The outstanding parts of the church as well as its pedestal were decorated with bas-reliefs, the subjects of which were chosen by Metropolitan Philaret of Moscow; they were carved by the most noted sculptors of the time. On each of the four facades was a flight of fifteen steps of Finnish granite leading up to the massive bronze doors, decorated with scenes from the Old and New Testaments.
     
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