The original plan for a cathedral on Vasilievsky Island was first planned during the reign of Peter the Great, but this plan was shelved upon Peter's death. Instead a wooden church dedicated to St Andrew was built between 1729 and 1731 upon the order of Peter's wife Empress Catherine I and according to a project by architect Giuseppe Trezzini. In 1761 the cathedral was struck by lightning and burned to the ground.  A new stone structure was built in the baroque style between 1764 and 1780.  After the Revolution the cathedral briefly became part of the Renovationist Church, but it was subsequently closed in 1938, only to be reopened in 1992.  In 2001 an obelisk dedicated to 300th anniversary of the Russian Order of St Andrew was unveiled outside the cathedral.

Three Holy Hierarchs' Church 

Just next to the cathedral is the Three Holy Hierarchs' Church which was consecrated in 1760 when St Andrew's Cathedral was still built out wood. Just before the Revolution the small church was used by St Petersburg's Georgian community. After the 1930s it was used as a factory of knitted goods. It was reopened for worship in the 1990s.