In 1896, the plot together with the house, built according to the project of architect A.K. Kolman, then still on Sergievskaya Street (now Tchaikovsky), was bought by the collegiate adviser A.F. Kelсh. The money for the purchase was taken from the dowry of his wife, V.P. Kelсh, and the ownership was transferred to her name.

Architects Vasily Shene and Vladimir Chagin worked on the reconstruction of the mansion. According to their project, the house was built over, the facades and interiors were redesigned. However, the landlady had not liked the finished house, so she invited another architect, Karl Schmidt, who did not change the facades, but erected a Gothic pavilion in the courtyard, thanks to which the final ensemble of the decoration and interior of the mansion was formed.

Having emigrated to Paris in 1904, Mrs. Kelсh left the mansion to her husband and children. But yet in 1905, the family's fortune began to dwindle. In 1910, the Kelсh couple formalized a divorce, and in 1914 A.F. Kelсh sold the mansion to I.M. Alexandrov, a member of the council of the Mutual Credit Trading Society.

After the revolution, the house was nationalized. In different years, the School of Screen Art, the committee of the CPSU of the Dzerzhinsky district, the UNESCO department were located here. In 1998 the house was transferred to St. Petersburg State University, and now the building belongs to the Ministry of Justice.