THE HERMITAGE MUSEUM, Leningrad, USSR

Catherine the Great built the Hermitage in 1765 to house her art collection. Between 1840 and 1852, the Hermitage was extended by Nicholas I For the Tsars' works of art. Today, the Hermitage has one of the world's foremost art collections. Many famous French and Dutch painters are well represented, for example, Rembrandt, Poussin, Wateau, Cezanne and Matisse. The museum consists of about 1,100 rooms with very old floors. About 20 different types of wood have been used on the floors and the blocks have been arranged in elaborate patterns. Some of the floors are works of art in themselves. All the rooms are coated regularly with D-503 Pacific Strong. This is Bona's water-borne polyurethane finish for floors with high levels of traffic. The traffic could hardly be higher than at the Hermitage where 10,000-30,000 visitors pass through the museum each day. But Pacific Strong was not just chosen for its strength. In this case, solvent-based finishes were out of the question because the fumes could damage the priceless collection of paintings.