Little Paris style building, dating from the 1900s, in the hibernal weather of January 2012, Berthelot Street, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Vigil for Vaclav Havel, Hrad castle courtyard, Prague, 22 Dec. '11 (photo: Daniela Oana Gagu)

Havel was equally an intellectual of highest calibre and creator of literary masterpieces, an authentic product of his country’s sophisticated and rich heritage. He was also closely linked with the world of architecture through the work of his grandfather, Vácslav Havel, one of the architects of Lucerna Palace, the first commercial and cultural complex of Prague, an innovative design built at the beginning of the c20th.

A cutting edge innovation of that period was the Czech cubist architecture, unique to that country. It represents one of the most original historic forms of architectural expression in Europe, which unfurled during the 1910s, for just a few short years preceding the Great War. The proponents of Czech cubism were part of a group that admired the creations of Picasso and Braque, which included creators from different artistic fields, among them the painter and writer Josef Čapek who introduced the word “robot” for human-like machines. They realised the pivotal importance of Picasso’s and other great artists of cubism’s work and ideas in exposing the elemental essence of their subjects through representations of straight lines and figures, as revealed by both latest scientific discoveries of the industrial era, and artistic products of the “primitive” communities from Africa or Oceania. The architects belonging to that group, people like Josef Gočár, Vlastislav Hofman or Josef Chochol, endeavoured to infuse those ideas in their designs by means of crystal-like outlines and facets applied to the overall building architecture, reducing and unifying as many elements as possible to an envisaged primordial cubist state. They in fact, by applying the principles of cubism, wonderfully prefigured in an novel way, the global Art Deco and Modernist styles of the inter-war period or even, I venture to say, the deconstructivism of the late c20th. The legacy of Czech cubism continued in the years between the world wars through an equally fascinating offshot named Rondocubism, that combined cubism with Czech ethnographic motifs, an order also termed as the Czech national architectural style.

The images bellow illustrate one of the cubist houses of Prague, designed by architect Josef Chochol, located at the base of Vysehrad hill, on the river Vltava’s Rasin Embankment. The edifice was built in 1912 – ’13, being the earliest cubist project of Chochol. The photographs were provided by Daniela Oana Gagu, a reader of my blog and good friend, who works and lives in Prague. Oana has also witnessed and went through the collective grief with the occasion of Vaclav Havel’s death, furthermore sending the evocative image, presented above, with the vigil outside Hrad Cathedral for that great personality of Czech and European history.

Cubist style house, Rasin Embankment, Vysehrad, Prague (Photo Daniela Oana Gagu)

Chochol abundantly uses crystal-like shapes in modelling the different architectural elements making up the edifice. I can sense that he tries to organically integrate the cubist forms as completely as possible within the overall architectural design of the house, although remnants of the old styles are easily detectable, such as baroque echoes seen in the elevated roof or central pediment.

Cubist style house, Rasin Embankment, Vysehrad, Prague (Photo Daniela Oana Gagu)

The basrelief embellishing the polygonal pediment is a later addition, representing national legends connected with Vysehrad castle. Remarkable is also the cubist style ironwork of the balcony.

Cubist style house, Rasin Embankment, Vysehrad, Prague (Photo Daniela Oana Gagu)

Above is one of the side façades where the crystal-like motifs and shapes come together even more expressively, afforded by their higher density, giving the impression of spilling over into the street through the interesting cubist design of the gate poles.

Cubist style house, Rasin Embankment, Vysehrad, Prague (Photo Daniela Oana Gagu)

Cubist style house, Rasin Embankment, Vysehrad, Prague (Photo Daniela Oana Gagu)

Josef Chochol's cubist house, Rasin Embankment, Vysehrad, Prague (in Rostislav Svada: "Cubist Prague, 1900-1925. A Guide book", Central Europe Gallery and Publishing House, Prague)

The Czech cubist architecture was not only limited to the architecture of the exterior, but envisioned to encompass as much as possible of the habitable space, as can be learned from the plan of this house, going as far as to the minute design of furniture and day to day objects. It anticipated something of a “cubist way of life”, in tone with the high hopes of the modern industrial society of that time, which was so thoroughly shattered not long after by the conflagration of the Great War.

Valentin Mandache

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

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If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Historic Houses of Romania architectural history tour, Sunday 22 Jan. '12, in Mosilor area of Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Dear readers,

This is an invitation to an architectural walking tour in Mosilor area of Bucharest, open to all of you who would like to accompany me, the author of the Historic Houses of Romania blog, next Sunday, 22 January ’12, for 3 hours, between 11.00 am – 2.00 pm !

I will be your expert guide through one of the most picturesque areas of historic Bucharest, that has known a spectacular development after the unification of the Principalities of Wallachia and Moldavia in the aftermath of the Crimean War. It is located on the road stemming from the old city toward Moldavia, known in the olden times as “The Highway” (“Drumul Mare”). Its name comes from that of the famous Mosilor fair, held outside Bucharest’s walls, where traders and peasants from Moldavia and north-eastern Wallachia came with their goods and products. Among of the most active and successful traders were the Armenians, who had strong communities in Moldavia and many settled in the Mosilor area, where they erected the largest Armenian church in south-east Europe. The architecture thus very much reflects an effervescent commercial past, with interesting examples of trader houses built in a multitude of vernacular and elevated styles ranging from Little Paris, Neo-Romanian to Art Deco. There is also a rare examples of Ottoman Balkan era dwelling, Casa Melik, dating from the c18th. Mosilor is thus a most representative sample of what Bucharest has been throughout most of its history, a trade centre for the Romanian lands. Its attractive and very evocative period architecture is waiting to be discovered by you!

The meeting point is in front of the Armenian Church gates - 43, Carol I Boulevard (easily reachable by foot, bus or trolleybus from the University Square), at 10.45 – 11.00 am; see the map bellow. We will then proceed to discover and photograph the historic architecture of this quaint area of Bucharest.

I look forward to seeing you there!

Valentin Mandache, expert in historic houses (tel: 0040 (0)728323272)

Bucharest's Mosilor area historic architecture (©Valentin Mandache)

Historic Houses of Romania tour: Mosilor area, Bucharest

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contactpage of this weblog.

Historic Houses of Romania: images from today's (Sunday 15 Jan. 2012) architectural walking tour in Cotroceni quarter of Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Art Nouveau Bucharest: images from today's Historic Houses of Romania tour (©Valentin Mandache)

I am organising a thematic two hour (between 12.00 – 14.00h) architectural tour this Saturday 14 January ’12, on the subject of the exceedingly interesting, but often elusive Art Nouveau architecture of Bucharest. It may be of interest to any of you visiting the city as a tourist or on business looking to find out more about its fascinating historic architecture and identity.

The innovative and flamboyant Art Nouveau current that emerged at the end of c19th, as a reaction to the rigidity of the historicist  styles and academic art, had also an important impact in the Fin de Siècle Romania. Its most lasting influence was the articulation within its coordinates of the local national style, known today as Neo-Romanian, in a similar manner with other emerging national styles in the rest of Eastern Europe. Today the once exquisite Art Nouveau remnants are hard to notice by the untrained eye, although they are scattered throughout the area of old Bucharest. This tour endeavours to locate and explain to you some of the significant Art Nouveau representations and buildings still around the city and give you an overall image about this style and its impact on the architectural development of Romania’s capital.

We will meet  starting between 11.45-12.00h in Piata Romana square, on the corner of ASE (Economics University) building next to Caderea Bastiliei Street, see the map bellow, and proceed from there for two hours to discover at first hand, how the international artistic phenomenon of Art Nouveau unfurled in this corner of south east Europe.

I look forward to seeing you there,

Valentin Mandache, expert in Romania’s historic houses (tel: 0040 (0)728323272)

Art Nouveau Bucharest - architectural tour (©Valentin Mandache)

Art Nouveau Bucharest - architectural tour

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contactpage of this weblog.

Sunday 8 Jan. '12 architectural tour in Carol Park, Bucharest: Remnants of the Great Exhibition of 1906 (©Valentin Mandache)

The conceptual tools employed in analysing the architectural phenomenon of that age in central and western Europe are, in my opinion, not wholesomely adequate in examining the stylistic complexity of the Brancovan style buildings, where a more feasible means of investigation would be that used in interpreting the Christian and especially the Islamic architecture of the Ottoman Empire, a realm within which Wallachia was then an integral part.

What we permanently need to take into account is that the Christian message of following the salvation call and example of Jesus, in the conditions of being a subordinated religion to the Muslim one, the supreme faith and also ideology of the Ottoman caliphate, generated an entirely different dynamics of artistic and implicitly architectural expression within the Christian millet that included the then Principality of Wallachia, distinct from what was taking place in countries where Christianity was the uncontested supreme religion and ideology as in Russia or Austria. The Brancovan architecture became thus expressed through coordinates specific to the cultural environment of the Ottoman dominion, searching for the harmony and universality of the mankind within the reality of the political, economic and cultural primacy of the Musslim world. The architecture became in that way a privileged province of free and sophisticated artistic expression, of spiritual travail toward the attainment of the ideals symbolised by the deeds and life of Jesus, which fascinated not only the high minded princes Serban Cantacuzino and Constantin Brancoveanu during whose reigns took shape and content what we now call the Brancovan style, but also the Wallachian population, which preserved and insured the continuity of the style after the Phanariot regime was later imposed over them.

Valentin Mandache, expert in Romania’s historic houses

The cupola turret of Mantuleasa church in bucharest, built in 1734 in late Brancovan style. It is probably an inter-war restoration, in close respect of the the original structure (©Valentin Mandache)

Gravestone slabs, mid-c17th, from the beginnings of the Brancovan style, Stelea Monastery, Targoviste (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Case de Epoca - Historic Houses of Romania blog author at the grave of architect Ion Mincu (1852 - 1912); photo - 7 Jan. '12

I am pleased to report that the architectural tour, which took place last Saturday, in Bellu Cemetery, considered in many aspects as the National Pantheon of Romania, was well attended, despite the sleety weather that we had to face that afternoon. That followed a stormy night, which caused mayhem in Bucharest. In fact we encountered, within the cemetery itself, torn away tree branches blocking the alleys and even an uprooted old tree that has fallen over some of the gravestone, fortunately without causing much damage, facts that all concurred to producing, of what one might say, a perfect cemetery visit atmosphere. The place is really vast, over 28 ha, if we just take into account its main Christian Orthodox denomination section. We were thus able to encounter a multitude of fine architecture monuments hosting the earthly remains of important personalities of this country. The funerary structures display in general the three main historical styles that characterise the local urban architecture from Little Paris, Neo-Romanian to Art Deco and Modernist designs. There are also monuments in ethnographic and composite styles. An important objective of the tour was the viewing and examination of monuments designed by the architect Ion Mincu (1852 – 1912), the initiator of the Neo-Romanian style, which are among the finest in the entire cemetery, for example the sepulchers of G. Gr. Cantacuzino, M. Ghica, or the Gheorghieff brothers. I also brought the participants to Mincu’s grave, where the photograph presented above was taken. To our astonishment, the grave was without a cross or other more apparent funerary monument, except a name plate on a small pedestal outside the grave area itself, a sure sign of neglect from the public and authorities regarding the memory of this important figure in the history of Romanian visual arts. The parcel was in the past embellished with a beautiful Romanian peasant wooden cross, as can be seen in a photograph from the 1920s, in the image bellow, depicting a remembrance gathering of Mincu’s students at his burial place. It is amazing and shocking that now, in 2012, when we commemorate one hundred years since the great man’s death, that there is nothing put in place to properly mark his grave, not even by the Architecture University “Ion Mincu” in Bucharest, which bears his name, and is the chief higher education institution in that field of this country. I just hope that something is in the making, now at the centenary of his death, by the university or other institution, to right that tragic anomaly!

Former students of architect Ion Mincu at his grave in Bellu Cemetery in the early 1920s (photo in "Ioan Mincu" by N. Petrascu, Cultura Nationala, Bucharest 1928)

Greetings for 2012! (Neo-Romanian style panel, 1920s house, Stirbei Voda area, Bucharest, ©Valentin Mandache)

Dear readers,

I would like to wish you an excellent 2012! The photograph above presents an exquisite Ne0-Romanian style façade panel dating from the late 1920s, presenting two winged fantastic animals, half-way between lion and eagle, also known as griffin, guarding the garden of paradise, seen as a vine plant laden with grape fruit, springing up from two rope threads, a sort of local yin and yang principles. It symbolises prosperity and stability, which are, I believe, very appropriate as wishes for the new year!

Yours,

Valentin Mandache, expert in Romania’s historic houses

Word cloud showing the most used 150 words of the front page of Historic Houses of Romania blog, generated by wordle.net on 30 December 2012

1. The NEO-ROMANIAN ARCHITECTURAL STYLE: a brief guide on its origins and features
2. Art Deco Building Interior Elements
3. Psychedelic-like Design Art Deco Doorway
4. Bucharest mid-1930s Art Deco Style House
5. Art Nouveau Beer Restaurant in Provincial Romania
6. Earthquake Events in Bucharest and Their Effect on Historic Houses
7. Lilac leaf shaped Art Nouveau windows
8. Travel writing: trip to Naples, Pompeii and Herculaneum
9. Masonic Symbol on a Neo-Romanian Style Panel
10. Superlative Bucharest Art Deco House
11. Inverted ziggurat motif Art Deco windows
12. The FOUR BUILDING BOOMS of BUCHAREST
13. CASOTA CONAC: a magnificent Romanian period property with a great potential
14. Bucharest’s Art Deco glass canopies
15. The FINIALS of Neo-Romanian style houses
16. The Romanian Revolution of 1989- Twenty Years On. A Book Review
17. Art Deco Floral Motifs for Birthday Celebration
18. Picturesque Little Paris style house
19. Art Deco Style Greek God Bass-Reliefs: Photomontage & Slide Show
20. ALLEGORICAL SCULPTURES on the Building of Romania’s National Bank

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Clamshell doorway canopy, 1890s Little Paris style house, Mosilor area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The glazed clamshell canopies, which still delight Bucharest’s visitors, are inspired from the French late c19th architecture that incorporated the technological advances of the period in using wrought iron and glazed structures, pioneered even earlier by London’s Crystal Palace, expressed in iconic designs such as the roof of Le Grand Palais or Paris Metro entrances.

Neo-Romanian style decorative panel (1m lenght horizontally), late 1920s house, Cotroceni area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The Neo-Romanian decorative panels adorn many period houses in that style throughout the city. They depict abstract scenes from biblical stories or peasant mythology, being rendered in the manner of Brancovan church representations of the early c18th, which themselves are a remarkable synthesis, peculiar to the visual arts in the old principality of Wallachia, between indigenous, Byzantine, Ottoman, Renaissance and baroque motifs. The above panel shows a metaphor for the Garden of Eden, where peacocks as personifications of beauty and peace, feed themselves from grape fruit hanging from a luxuriant and elaborately contorted vine plant, a main agricultural crop in Romania and also  a symbol of the country’s rich natural environment, seen as the paradise on earth. The symbolism of the panel is that of the prosperity and well being for the house inhabitants. Interestingly, the peacocks show also eagle-like features, such as the curved beak, stern eyes and potent claws, a dual character that shows them also as protectors of that house, of the familly that dwells there. The “multi-role” appearance of animals or plants is quite a speciality of the Neo-Romanian imagery as eloquently shown in this panel.

Art Deco style doorway, late 1930s house, Dorobanti area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The Art Deco style is well represented in Bucharest through a great multitude of private and public buildings, the best exemplified such type of architecture in the entire South East Europe. The intelligent and harmonious design of their doorways is among the most conspicuous hallmark for those edifices, together of course with their wonderful staircase towers, porthole windows, decorative panels or ocean liner-like flag poles. There are literary many thousand of doorway designs to be admired, many of them of high quality. Above is a good such example, which displays the rule of three, a defining parameter of the Art Deco style, being probably an abstraction of a 1930s city skyline with tall buildings and sunrays bursting through the gaps between their tops, an epitome of those confident times in the forth decade of the c20th.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

The staircase well of a mid-1930s Art Deco house, Matei Basarab area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The staircase well pictured above is from a derelict Art Deco style building, inhabited by poor state tenants (housed there since the 1950s when the house was confiscated from its owners by the communist regime). It is unlit, the natural illumination at its top coming through porthole shape windows.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

The majesty of a grand Neo-Romanian style house, dating from the late 1920s, in a typical Bucharest hibernal landscape (www.historo.wordpress.com)

Season’s greetings dear readers! I hope you enjoyed this year’s articles on the delightful period architecture from this region of South East Europe!

Valentin Mandache, expert in Romania’s historic houses

The tribulations of Romania's historic architecture (©Valentin Mandache)

I envisioned the above composition as an allegory about the tribulations and resilience of Romania’s built historic landscape, which has evolved in a part of Europe that for the most part of the last half millennium has been at the capricious crossroads of confronting empires.

see it full screen, 720p HD

The video is a short metaphoric retrospective of Case de Epoca – Historic Houses of Romania blog’s activity in 2011. I shot were over 15,000 frames, posted more than 200 articles, read by on average 15,000 unique site visitors per month, and undertook over 50 architectural tours with participating public that came from all over the world. On the whole, it has been an exciting year! For 2012 I plan more tours in Bucharest and the rest of Romania, another batch of out of the ordinary architectural history articles and as a novelty- architectural history courses.

Yours,
Valentin Mandache, expert in Romania’s historic houses

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

"The Late Neo-Romanian Style" - Saturday 17 Dec. '11 architectural tour: identity panel on Neo-Romanian style house, dating from the early 1930s, Kisselef area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The Saturday tour started on a quite unpromising rainy weather, which was probably the reason why the participation came from Ireland, with no natives at all However the conditions improved less than half an hour into the excursion, when we benefited from beautiful sunbursts through clouds crossing Bucharest’s sky. We had the opportunity to examine a great multitude of Late Neo-Romanian style houses, concentrated in the Kisselef area of the city, rounding up our image about this particular phase in the development in Romania’s national architectural style, which unfurled between the late 1920s and the end of the 1940s. As the tour came to a close, the intriguing panel presented here came in our view. It contains the representation of a tree from whose trunk springs out a human arm holding a bucket, having on the other side something looking like a stack of six spheres arranged like the dots on a dice face. This panel could be, in my opinion, a family coat of arms or even a Masonic symbol connected with the first proprietor of the house. I look forward for opinions from you, dear readers, who might have access to better information, to clarify that tormenting, for me, riddle!

"Cismigiu historic area" - Sunday 18 Dec. '11 architectural tour: excursion participants

The Saturday tour in Cismigiu quarter was well attended by a nationally diverse group (Australia, US, Ireland and natives of course). We benefited of a wonderful weather, with a bright sun and a crisp, clear atmosphere propitious to view intricate architectural details. The trip started at Izvor tube station, ending at the Romanian Classical Writers’ Round in Cismigiu Gardens, after an assiduous walk of over five kilometres in three hours, examining at close range a large number of exquisite historic buildings. The photograph shows us toward the end of the tour, all with quite happy faces in my opinion, myself exhibiting a bit of the effects of speaking almost continuously throughout in my quality as a guide. :)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Saturday 10 December '11: Art Deco & Modernist Bucharest tour (©Valentin Mandache)

Sunday 11 December '11: Bucharest's Dacia quarter tour (©Valentin Mandache)

You are kindly invited to this coming week end’s tours: Saturday 17 Dec. ’11 – “The Late Neo-Romanian Architectural Style” (13.00h – 15.00h) and Sunday 18 Dec. ’11: “The Cismigiu Quarter’s Architecture” (10.30h – 13.30h). I will post detailed announcements in the next couple of days.

Valentin Mandache, expert in Romania’s historic houses

***********************************************

I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Art Deco style doorway, mid-1930s apartment house, Dacia area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Art Deco style doorhandle, mid-1930s house, Piata Rosetti area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Art Deco style doorhandle, mid-1930s house, Piata Rosetti area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Art Deco style doorway with original doorhandle, mid-1930s house, Piata Rosetti area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Art Nouveau lettering: the name panoply for "Banca Agricola" ("The Agricultural Bank") dating from the 1900s, CEC area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Art Nouveau lettering: "Let's be faithful" on the pavement at the western entrance of Amzei Church, dating from 1901, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Art Deco style glass etching, part of a staircase tower window of a late 1930s apartment house in Mantuleasa quarter, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

This glass etching is a nice discovery made during last Sunday’s walking architectural tour in Mantuleasa quarter of Bucharest, when I entered, together with the participants, the hallway of a small and well designed Art Deco apartment house (in the shape of an abstract ocean liner). My intention was to show the tour party how a typical Art Deco stair spiral looks and how the light is filtered through the patterns of the large window that usually embellishes the staircase tower of such edifices. The etching, spotted first by Gabriela, one of the participants, was not part of the main window, but placed on another side of the tower at the staircase base, probably to increase the amount of natural light available in that confined space. The subject of this piece of art, signed by Studio N.I.C.O., as seen on the lower right hand corner, and its rendering are just wonderful, depicting a mountain landscape having at its centre a human shape forest deity (perhaps Diana, the goddess of wild animals and woodlands) flanked by two delicate hinds, all surrounded by an alpine landscape (perhaps that of the Transylvanian Alps to the north of Bucharest) with the sky dominated by a few glowing solar motifs and round clouds. The manner of representation, especially that of the human-like personage, reminds me of how Henri Matisse designed his subjects, as is most tellingly seen in The Dance, one of his most well known painting. Matisse was of course widely admired in Romania of that era, even more so after he produced the painting La Blouse Roumaine, a young female wearing an embroidered  Romanian peasant shirt. I am just amazed how this fragile etching, that is still in excellent condition, has survived so many vicissitudes that befell the city in the last eighty years, from wars, devastating earthquakes to dictatorships.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Saturday 3 December '11: The mature Neo-Romanian style architectural tour (©Valentin Mandache)

Sunday 4 December '11: Mantuleasa quarter architectural tour (©Valentin Mandache)

This week’s tours, at which you are kindly invited to participate, are the following: a thematic architectural tour on Saturday 10 Dec. ’11 (13.00h – 15.00) entitled “The Art Deco and Modernist Bucharest” and an area one on Sunday 11 Dec. ’11 (10.30h – 13.30h) in Bucharest’s Dacia quarter. I will post detailed announcements in the next couple of days.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

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If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

The doorway of a 1900s Ploiesti house (©Valentin Mandache)

Art Nouveau style ironwork decorating the upper window of a 1900s doorway in Ploiesti, southern Romania (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Click titles for access!

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Art Deco transparent staircase window, apartment block dating from the late 1930s, Dacia area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Art Deco transparent staircase window, apartment block dating from the mid-1930s, Calea Mosilor area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Historic Houses of Romania thematic architectural tour on Saturday, 26 Nov. '11: "Art Nouveau Bucharest" (©Valentin Mandache)

Historic Houses of Romania architectural tour on Sunday, 26 Nov. '11: "Piata Victoriei area"(©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Neo-Romanian style roof finial in the shape of a mace, mid-1920s house, Buzau (©Valentin Mandache)

Neo-Romanian style roof finial in the shape of a mace, the Commune Palalce (town hall), Buzau (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

The Serliana structure is a quite a common occurrence in Renaissance, Baroque or Rococo inspired architectural settings. I have therefore been pleasantly surprised to discover in Bucharest a Serliana-like window, with a suggested arch, within a modernist setting, presented in the photographs bellow:

Modernist Serliana window, late 1930s house, Dorobanti quarter, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The design is reduced to essence, even the pillars dividing the openings displaying just outlines of Renaissance columns.

Modernist Serliana window, late 1930s house, Dorobanti quarter, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The building dates just before the Second World War, located in the Dorobanti area, also known as the “embassy quarter” of Romania’s capital.

Modernist Serliana window, late 1930s house, Dorobanti quarter, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The architecture is an inter-war Modernist interpretation of Renaissance Italianate models, seen in the veranda column capital or its beamed ceiling, the Serliana window of course, and the wooden corbels supporting the protruding structure (Oriel type) containing the Serliana.

Modernist Serliana window, late 1930s house, Dorobanti quarter, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Decorative tiles from the Art Deco era, apartment block from Gara de Nord area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Above is a wall base decorated with high quality black and white bands of ceramic tiles, which I documented in an earlier post, speculating that it represents an architectural metaphor of the tuxedo suit and spectaor/ wingtip shoes so popular in the jazz age.

Decorative stone from the Art Deco era, apartment block from Gara de Nord area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The image above and the three following bellow are from the entrance hall of a mid-1930s apartment block, where the designer used good quality decorative stone, from marble to various colours and textures of calcareous rock such as lime and travertine, combining them with great visual effect.

Decorative stone from the Art Deco era, apartment block from Gara de Nord area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Decorative stone from the Art Deco era, apartment block from Gara de Nord area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Decorative stone from the Art Deco era, entrance hall pavement of an apartment block from Gara de Nord area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Decorative tiles from the Art Deco era, apartment block from Gara de Nord area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The above and bellow photographs present the ceramic tile floor of a modest apartment block from the early 1930s. The tiles are of very good quality, being in excellent shape after so many years of intensive wear; of hexagonal shape, arranged in a plain three colour floral “mosaic” pattern, which reminds quite poignantly the atmosphere of the inter-war period.

Decorative tiles from the Art Deco era, apartment block from Gara de Nord area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

***********************************************

I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Neo-Romanian style facade, house dating from the mid-1920s, Mosilor area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

This it how an “ordinary” Neo-Romanian style house façade looks. The four storey building dates from the mid 1920s and belongs to the mature stage of development of this style, which took place between 1906, the year of the Great Royal National Exhibition, when the Neo-Romanian order was made known to the wider public, thenceforth becoming fashionable among the mass of the citizens, and the late 1920s, when the style reached a crisis of expression under the “assault” of modern forms, ideas and technologies brought about by the increasingly popular, in Bucharest and Romania, Art Deco and Modernist styles. This particular façade displays a multitude of archetypal Neo-Romanian elements such as references to the Christian trinity in the number of window sectors (envisaged as triptychs), the number of three-lobed veranda arcades, etc., short columns decorated with the rope motif, arched window pediments, or an allusion to the cula tower (the c17th-c18th fortified yeoman houses of Oltenia region in the frontier south western region of the country) seen in the massive protruding multi storey Oriel window-veranda structure.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Neo-Romanian style windows, house dating from the 1910s, Dacia area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Above is a good example of Neo-Romanian style triptych motif set of windows from the mature phase of development of Romania’s national style, which took place between 1906 (the year of the Great Royal National Exhibition when the style was made known to the larger public) and the late 1920s (when the Neo-Romanian style reached a crisis of expression generated among others by the increased popularity of the international Art Deco and Modernist architecture). I like the broken arch embellishing the central window, an echo of the late medieval Brancovan church architecture, which in its turn is inspired from the Islamic Ottoman architecture of the Balkans of that era. The pediment is decorated with vine leaves and grapes springing up from two plant pots, symbolising abundance in paradise, a metaphor for the prosperity and peace of the family inhabiting that house.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Balcic - Queen Marie of Romania's Palace gardens on Bulgaria's Black Sea Coast

Historic Houses of Romania blog author enjoying, in the summer of 2009, the magnificent gardens of Queen Marie of Romania’s Palace in Balcic, Bulgaria, on the Black Sea coast. The palace complex and gardens are one of the finest and most representative pieces of architecture produced in inter-war Romania. Balcic and the southerly facing coast around it is a place reminding more of the Mediterranean than the Balkans and Central Europe that in general characterise Romania’s geographic and man-made landscape, which made it a sort of local Riviera for the Romanian elite in those happy days before the conflagration of the Second World War and what followed after. The place is teeming with Romanian villa architecture of the golden 1930s decade, which will constitute, together with the Palace, the subject of two Historic Houses of Romania tours in the late spring and early autumn in 2012. Watch this space!

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

"Round" Neo-Romanian window, early 1930s house, Patriarchy Hill area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

"Round" Neo-Romanian window, early 1930s house, Gradina Icoanei area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Art Deco style gate, late 1930s house, Foisorul de Foc area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

I like the pleasant to the eye proportions of this gate and how its general rectangular pattern is broken by diagonal wave and solar disk motifs wonderfully distributed throughout the design field. It is perhaps an abstraction of a modern city (the rectangular pattern) on an ocean shore bathed by undulating sea waves in its daily life cycle from dawn till dusk and over again (the full and outlined solar disks), etc.

Art Deco style house dating from the late 1930s, Foisorul de Foc area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The house has good volumetric proportions adapted to the small plot of land available for construction, an ubiquitous and age old problem in Bucharest. The rule of three typical of the Art Deco style is detectable in many of the design elements of the façade. Interesting is also the wall rendering, which reproduces the coral motif of the Southern seas, a theme popular in those years among Bucharesters, aspiring to visit exotic places so different from their continental European landscape and climate.

Art Deco style house dating from the late 1930s, Foisorul de Foc area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The staircase window is also embellished with a high quality ironwork which shares the design theme of the gate. There is also a porthole window, an echo of the ocean liner theme so fashionable in those happy years after the Great Economic Depression and before the conflagration of the Second World War.

Staircase tower window (©VM)

The staircase window design is indeed remarkable, a cubist-like painting rendered in ironwork.

Concierge window, late 1930s Art Deco style house, Foisorul de Foc area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

The 1930s architect was obviously a talented professional who paid attention to minutiae details, such as the concierge window seen in this photograph, cut within the rusticated pattern of the façade base, itself resembling a marvellous avant-garde composition.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Neo-Romanian style corbel lamp, mid-1930s house, Kiseleff area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

I located, during my “The Late Neo-Romanian style” architecture tour a couple of weeks ago, an exterior lamp of that design, which is a rare object, with only a handful of such artifacts still surviving throughout Bucharest. I already documented three other Neo-Romanian lamp finds in the following articles: incense burner shape lamps, lantern-like lamp and Greek cross shape lamp. In this particular example, the relic is attached to an elaborate wood and concrete-modelled corbel, being made from molded glass meshed in an attractive wire pattern in tone with the decorations featured on corbel ends. It decorates a late Neo-Romanian style house dating from the mid-1930s, which features a large access stair covered by an extensive roof eave supported at regular intervals by corbels, all originally embellished with the interesting glass and wire lamp model presented in this article.

Neo-Romanian style corbel lamp, mid-1930s house, Kiseleff area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Old Bucharest pebble road, Radu Voda monastery gardens, (©Valentin Mandache)

Before the advent of cubic stone paved roads in the mid-c19th and tarmac laid ones around 1900s, most of old Bucharest’s streets were unpaved at all. The few ones deemed essential enough to have them surfaced, such as Podul Mogosoaiei (now called Calea Victoriei), the main artery that linked the city with the north of the then Wallachian Principality, were paved paved with heavy oak planks, a timber provided in abundance from forests in the hilly area about 70km to the north. The smaller important inner city roads, such as those in Lipscani, the commercial quarter, or those used for princely or religious ceremonies, were paved with pebbles collected from the Dambovita riverbed, the main river course that crosses the old city. Nowadays roads surfaced with timber are of course long gone, while there are still surviving rare short stretches of pebble surfaces, mostly within the courtyards of some old churches. The photograph above shows one of those antique pavements, surviving within the Radu Voda monastery courtyard, a very short distance from the Dambovita river, from where the pebbles were sourced. The stones were transported by the river over perhaps thousand of years from the Bucegi Mountains in the Transylvanian Alps, where the Dambovita river source is. I examined them closely and was able to see the mountain rock geology from which they originate, which is mainly a sedimentary formation known as Bucegi conglomerate, which dates from the Cretaceous times, being found at altitudes  between 1000 and 2000 metre high. This small stretch is very picturesque and a telling vestige of Bucharest’s old urban fabric and identity,  which in large part has disappeared from its built environment.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

Art Deco street fence, mid-1930s property, Cotoroceni area, Bucharest (©Valentin Mandache)

Above is one of the multitude of Art Deco street fence motifs, which can be encountered by any casual visitor throughout Bucharest. It depicts a series of sunbursts or reflector beams, very typical of that style’s decorative panoply.

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.

"Lettering: a reference manual of techniques" by Andrew Haslam (Laurence King Publishing, London 2011)

"Lettering: a reference manual of techniques" by Andrew Haslam (Laurence King Publishing, London 2011)

The author of this blog holding a copy of "Lettering: a reference manual of techniques" by Andrew Haslam (Laurence King Publishing, London 2011)

The two Bucharest letter rendering photographs in "Lettering: a reference manual of techniques" by Andrew Haslam (Laurence King Publishing, London 2011)

The two Bucharest letter rendering photographs in "Lettering: a reference manual of techniques" by Andrew Haslam (Laurence King Publishing, London 2011)

Acknowledgements section of ”Lettering: a reference manual of techniques” by Andrew Haslam (Laurence King Publishing, London 2011)

Acknowledgements section mentioning the Historic Houses of Romania blog and its author in "Lettering: a reference manual of techniques" by Andrew Haslam (Laurence King Publishing, London 2011)

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I endeavour through this series of periodic articles to inspire appreciation of the historic houses of Romania, a virtually undiscovered, but fascinating chapter of European architectural history and heritage.

***********************************************

If you plan acquiring or selling a historic property in Romania or start a renovation project, I would be delighted to advice you in sourcing and transacting the property, specialist research, etc. To discuss your particular plan please see my contact details in the Contact page of this weblog.