Modernist style house, designed and built during the Wehrmacht's garrisoning of Campina (1941-1944), an oil town in Romania, for housing German oil experts stationed in the city. (©Valentin Mandache)
Campina is an important oil town 90km north of Bucharest, close by Ploiesti the oil refining centre of the country. During the Second World War, the Romanian oil powered a large part of the German war machine. The Wehrmacht, in order to protect that important war asset, deployed 200,000 soldiers in Romania, most of them concentrated in the oil production and refining centres, such as Campina. The German oil specialists, through the state oil company, were also present in the country and supervised or advised their Romanian colleagues. For the housing of these specialists, the Wehrmacht built a series high quality houses, such as the one presented in photograph above, located in Campina, which I found during an architectural photography trip in the area this week end. As I understood from taking with the neighbours of that house, the building belongs now to the former Romanian state oil company, now a joint stock company in which the state has a minority stake. What intrigued me the most was the modernist outline of this well proportioned edifice, which I believe is the design of a Wehrmacht or German state oil company architect. The international modernist style was not in official favour with the Nazi regime, which preferred designs that included or made references to national and Teutonic motifs. The architect in this case had probably profited of the higher degree of freedom in the less controlled environment offered by Romania, which was a subordinate ally at that time, far away from the Nazi state and its rigid views on architecture, and produced designs that were more at home in the pre-Nazi Germany.
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I endeavor through this daily image series to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural heritage.
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arata ca o rulota turtita
Hi Valentin
Great house. Am currently researching buildings by the German and Italian fascist regimes so it was great to see this example. Do you know of any further buildings in this style built by these regimes in Romania? Hope you can help
regards Robin
IN BUCHAREST ,THERE ARE SIMILAR VILLAS AROUND STR. SERBAN VODA, SF. VINERI , SCOALA IENACHITA VACARESCU GENERAL ARIA.,AND ALL OVER, IF I REMEMBER CORRECTLY ( ? )
MODERNIST STYLE= JUNGENSTILL , ART NOUVEAU ?
IN SPAIN IS CALLED MODERNISTA.
This is a fascinating find. Perhaps the utility value of the International Style also counted for something in such a setting, although as you say there was already a strong preceent for the style in Romania. And in Mussolini’s Italy this sort of building would have been no surprise at all!
I am glad you liked this post! Most probably the utility and practicality of the International Style should be factored-in in this case, although there were cases in Romania, where the Wehrmacht/ German architects designed buildings following Nazi percepts. For example the Bucharest-Braila railway line built by the Wehrmacht during the war for supplying the eastern front is dotted with train stations that look as being shipped over from Bavaria. My village is served by such a train station and I have been fascinated by its alien look ever since my childhood! So there is room for debate why the modernist designs occurred in the case of Campina; my hunch is because the architect made a greater use of the freedom offered to him in this far flung location at the periphery of the Nazi empire. Valentin