Cantacuzino Palace

Built in 1899–1902 by Gheorghe Grigore Cantacuzino (known as “The Nabob”, former mayor of Bucharest, leader of the Conservative Party, and one of the richest men in Romania ever), the architectural ensemble was designed by architect Ioan D. Berindei.

The Cantacuzino Palace can be found at 141, Calea Victoriei (Victoria Road), Bucharest. After G. G. Cantacuzino died in 1913, the palace was inherited by his son, Mihail G. Cantacuzino and his wife, Maria (also known as Princess Maruca, born Rosetti-Tescanu); after the premature death of her first husband, Maruca re-married in 1939, becoming the wife of George Enescu, Romania's greatest composer. In the 40’s, the palace hosted the Presidency of the Council of Ministers and since 1947 the Institute for Romanian-Soviet Studies.

After the death of George Enescu, in 1955, his wife donated the domain to the Museum and to the Composers’ and Musicologists’ Union of Romania, to be dedicated to the memory of the musician. Thus, on the 19th of June 1956, George Enescu Museum was opened. The museum gathers documents and pictures referring to the composer’s life and work. Among other exhibits, there also is the violin the composer received as a present when he turned 4 year old. There are regular classical music concerts hosted by the palace (many of them being organized by the Polish Cultural Institute), and this is a good time to visit the building (for otherwise, the main hall of the palace is not included in the regular museum visit).

The palace was set in French Baroque style with Art Nouveau elements. The façade’s richness in sculptural decoration is notable. On the top of the entrance, the circular fronton bears the princely coat of arms of the Cantacuzino family. The facade is dominated by the main entrance; above it there is a giant shell-shaped porte-cochére and two stone lions guard the stairs and the door that mingle harmoniously with the statues and other ornaments in the Baroque style, and wrought iron balconies surround the home's tall windows.

For the decoration of the building, the architect collaborated with several recognized artists of the time. The mural paintings were made by George Demetrescu Mirea, Nicolae Vermont, Costin Petrescu and Arthur Verona, the sculptures and the ornamentation are made by Emil Wilhelm Becker, while the artfulness of Krieger House in Paris can be admired in the interior decoration (tapestry, chandeliers, lamps, stained-glasses).

Gorneşti Castle

Gorneşti (Hungarian: Gernyeszeg) is a commune in Mureş County, Romania. It is situated on Mureş River, 17 km from Târgu-Mureş and has a Székely Hungarian majority (75%). The village was documentary attested in 1319 (as Knezeg), when the king of Hungary, Carol Robert of Anjou, donated it to the Prince of Transylvania, Szecseny Tamas. The Szecseny family owned the domain until 1395, when changed some properties with a certain Zsigmund. Between 1405-1642 it belonged to Erdelyi of Somkerek, then was in possession of the Teleki family until 1949. It seems that in the 15th-16th centuries here was a landlord residence, fortified with walls and water ditches.

 

Teleki is a prominent name in the history of Transylvania and Hungary. The aristocratic family was actively involved throughout the centuries in both political-administrative and cultural activities. In 1685, Mihaly Teleki (1634-1690) became Count of the Holy Roman Empire, receiving the title from Emperor Leopold I. But the most famous family member was Sámuel Teleki (1739-1822), chancellor of Transylvania and founder of the Teleki Library in Târgu-Mureş. The most interesting character in the family is certainly the famous explorer of Africa, Sámuel Teleki (1845-1916).

The castle, built between 1771-1778 and finalized in 1802 by Count László Teleki, is a representative example of Baroque architecture in Transylvania. The project seems to be realized by architect Andreas Mayerhoffer from Salzburg, the castle resembling with the palaces Pécel and Godollo made by him. It was built into an impressive arboretum, in so-called Grassalkovich style, very popular in Budapest, and is the only one in Transylvania that hosts a Baroque statues park.

The U-shaped architectural composition is balanced, the central body is "en decroche" and the decorative elements are elegantly articulated. The facade is marked in its center by a raised risalit with rounded corners. The high roof with a huge cupola in the middle has skylights and a clock on top. From the main body of the building starts two wings to the garden. The castle has 52 rooms and 365 windows, symbolizing the weeks and days of the year.

In the Baroque period, the emphasis was on illustrating the social status. In this residence, this is highlighted by space representation, main hall, monumental staircase, rooms for receptions, areas for study - especially the library - and spaces for different types of artistic performances.

The explorer Sámuel Teleki (1845-1916) kept in the castle his collection of illustrations and the family's library, including 6,000 volumes. Unfortunately, a large part of it was destroyed during the two world wars. Count Domokos Teleki (1880-1955), a carpet collector and scholar, kept his Oriental and Occidental rugs in Gorneşti Castle. Unfortunately the Teleki Collection was never published, although its richness can be guessed at from a few pieces now in the Hungarian National Museum and in the Budapest Museum of Applied Arts, among them a 17th century Ushak medallion carpet fragment (numbered 1292 in the Teleki Collection inventory!).

The garden started to be laid out between the building and the moat in 1782, during the ownership of József I Teleki. The earliest known garden scheme, dating from c.1792, features ornamental parterres. However, József I Teleki, probably inspired by Rousseau, with whom he was personally acquainted, wished to lay out a landscape garden at that time.

In the early decades of the 19th century, his son József II Teleki, who had traveled in England as well, brought the landscape garden to completion. For this purpose, the moat at certain points was widened to form pools, and filled up at others. The garden's most significant edifice is József II Teleki's monument erected by his widow after his death in 1817 in the middle of the park. A design dating from 1831 features, in addition, a gloriette and an obelisk. A fine collection of deciduous trees were enriched with conifers from the 1850s.

The garden's last significant phase of improvement took place at the beginning of the 20th century when Domokos Teleki aquired some 18th-century statuary for the park. Seven mythological statues may originally have stood in the garden of Starhemberg Palace in Vienna before being transported to a private garden in Buda in the 19th century. Also among these newly acquired statues is a group of four gnomes, originally part of a series. Park paths and banks of ponds were decorated with numerous allegorical statues, but busts, such as Mirabeau's or Louis XVI, works by sculptor Martinelli.

The last owner of the castle, Count Mihaly Teleki, donated it to the sanitary authorities of Romania. At the moment, the castle shelters the Tuberculosis Observation Sanatorium and it is claimed in court.

Photos from here.

The Sturdza Castle in Miclăuşeni

Around 1410, the ruling prince of Moldavia, Alexandru cel Bun, (1400-1432) gave to the boyar Miclăuş (1380-1440), member of the Prince's Council, a large estate, located near Siret River meadow. The estate became known as Miclăuşeni after the death of the nobleman. On April 25th 1591, Miclăuş's descendants sold the estate to treasurer Simon Stroici (1550-1623). He built a mansion whose ruins could still be seen at the beginning of the twentieth century. Through a last will of 5 June 1622, treasurer Simon Stroe bequeathed the Miclăuşeni village to Lupu Prăjăscu. In 1697, the descendants of Lupu Prăjăscu bequeathed the estate to brothers Ion and Sandu Sturdza, their distant relatives. On April 19 1699, Sturdza brothers have divided the possession, Miclăuşeni being awarded to Ion Sturdza.

In 1752, boyar Ion Sturdza (1710-1792) raised here a cross shaped landlord's mansion here with a basement and ground floor. The manor had 20 rooms, ten on each floor. The manor had stables with pure race trained horses. Concerned about extending the estate, the son of Ion Sturdza, Dimitrie, built during 1821-1823 a church in the yard, near the castle. He endowed it with a beautiful baroque iconostasis and many valuable religious objects. Dimitrie Sturdza wrote in 1802 the first draft of the Republican Constitution of the Romanian. Son of Dimitrie, Alecu Sturdza Miclăuşanu, arranged on a surface of 42 hectares around the mansion a beautiful English-style park with ornamental trees and many species flower alleys. He handled the purchase of several books and rare manuscripts collections that have enriched the manor's library. He died of cholera in 1848 and is buried in the church manor. After his death, his widow Catincathe administrated the estate and she left the it to his son, George A. Sturdza, in 1863.

In 1869, George Sturdza married Maria, daughter of writer Ion Ghica, and moved then to the estate. Between 1880 and 1904, George Sturdza built at the site of old mansion a beautiful palace in the late Gothic style, a copy of Western feudal castles and recalling the Palace of Culture, but also the Royal Palace of Ruginoasa. Construction plans have been made by the architects Julius Reinecke and I. Grigsberg. The castle was in those days a proof of high cultural level of its owners that brought among the Moldavia hills models of existence, of construction and of environment that Sturdza have found during his trips along the Southern and
Western Europe.

Outside, the building had numerous decorations (including emblems inspired by the Sturdza family crest: a lion with a sword and an olive branch), completed in 1898 in Art Nouveau style by architect Julius Reinecke. This was helped by Maria Sturdza, who illustrated many of the poems of Vasile Alecsandri, neighbor and a close family friend. Neo-Gothic influences are found in decoration such as Gothic towers, medieval armors, tower entrance with bridge over a water ditch, riding school hall, Latin dicta on walls. Inside, the castle has a central staircase in Dalmatia marble, elaborately carved rosewood furniture, fireplaces in terracotta, porcelain and earthenware, made abroad, intarsia parquet with essences of maple, mahogany, oak and ebony, made by Austrian craftsmen and painted ceilings and interior walls.

The Sturdza's family vast library of 60,000 books contained at the time exquisite books, published in the European space, the theological ones being directly ordered as soon as they were published. Out of all these, quite few ones were preserved; over 50.000 of them disappearing after the II World War.

The castle with the church (and now including the monastery and pilgrim and aging people centre) of Miclăuşeni comes in support of this idea belonging to the Metropolitan Orthodox Church of Moldavia and Bucovina and is waiting for Europe to discover it as an integrated part, not only since the third millennium but from the beginning of XXth century.

Thanks to Jurnal Românesc for the ideea!

Bánffy Palace in Cluj

The Bánffy Palace is a baroque building of the 18th century in Cluj-Napoca, designed by the German architect Johann Eberhard Blaumann from Sibiu (born in Böblingen), for György Bánffy, governor of Transylvania. Built between 1774 and 1775 it is considered the most representative for the baroque style of Transylvania. The palace has façades richly decorated with pilaster-statues, highly refined cornices; sumptuously done up inner court; aristocratic taste of inner rooms embellished with marble and stucco-works, fine parquetry, mirrors and chandeliers.


The former imposing residence of the Hungarian governors, the Banffy Palace is living two lives, one as the former palace and, after 1951, a cultural life conferred by its destination as an important cultural institution. The architect designed a plan with an enclosed court and one storey building. The storey is now destined to host The National Gallery.


Since 1951, the palace has housed the National Museum of Art Cluj-Napoca, which includes, in its Virgil Cioflec collection the works of arts of many important Romanian artists, such as Nicolae Grigorescu, Ştefan Luchian, Dimitrie Paciurea, Theodor Pallady, Camil Ressu and other. The international collection features paintings of major European artists like Luca Giordano, Carlo Dolci, Jean Hippolyte Flandrin, Felix Ziem, Ivan Aivazovsky, Herri met de Bles, Károly Lotz, Mihály Munkácsy, Franz Defregger, László Mednyánszky, József Koszta and István Réti, as well as sculptures of Claude Michel, Antoine-Louis Barye and Ernst Barlach. The graphic's collection includes works of great European printmakers of the 16th-20th centuries. Among those, the museum hosts works of Salvator Rosa, Giovanni Batista Piranesi, Honore Daumier, Theodore Gericault, Edgar Degas and Kaethe Kollwitz. The 22 halls of the Banffy Palace display sculptures, graphics, weapons, furniture, carpets, and paintings.


The Gallery professional restoration performed in 1990 rendered back its original-like aspect, yet perfectly suitable for its new role. Re-opened for public, in January 1996, The National Gallery offers a four-century synthesis of Romanian art with a stress on the artistic phenomenon in Transylvania: The Altar from Jimbor (16th century), art in the style of 1900, avant-guarde, artists related to "Şcoala Superioară de Arte Frumoase" and to the "Art Center Cluj", such as Szolnay Sandor, Pericle Capidan, Catul Bogdan, Aurel Ciupe, Alexandru Popp, Romul Ladea and others.

Ştirbey Palace

Barbu Ştirbei, ruling prince of Wallachia (1849-1853, 1854-1856), inherited a wide piece of land in Buftea, near Bucharest. One of his 9 sons, Alexandru Ştirbei, inherited the land in Buftea and built a palace there in 1864, on the design of a Swiss chateau and the original wooden staircases, shutters and roof create the atmosphere of a posh hunting lodge. Set over 24 hectares of park, the grounds are teaming with gingko, magnolia and cypresses, with oaks dating back 500 years.


Ştirbey Palace is one of the best examples of romantic architecture in Romania at the time of its accomplishment. The only information regarding the construction of the palace is found on the west side: the year 1864 and, above, the A-B-S letters, representing the name of Alexandru B. Ştirbey, are cut in the center of a circle accentuated by four arches with a Gothic profile.


The Gothic style, which is discreetly represented on the outside and more visibly so inside, is combined with decorations that talk about the interest in romantic searches of the European and Romanian architecture of the 19th century, all of these underlying the overall simplicity which confers this building its particular character. The interiors contain a rich decoration, with vast carved wood sections, everything being set around the interior staircase sculpted in oak and bearing the family blazon. The painted or sculpted wooden ceilings, the Neo-Gothic blazons above the doors, as well as the chimneys make the image complete about the interiors. Downstairs, in the central saloon, there are still very well preserved original windows and doors with their wooden frames, with oak gothic-like decorations, wooden beams, a fireplace of white Carrara marble, and the walls with classic wooden decorations.


As a consequence of his wife’s death, Alexandru Ştirbei built a monumental chapel in the park between 1885 and 1890, including traces of wall-paintings by neoclassic artist Gheorghe Tattarescu.


In 1895 however Alexandru died and his oldest son, Barbu Ştirbei, inherited the domain in Buftea. A passionate agriculturist, he founded a huge farm near the palace and started to buy pieces of land in the neighborhood, becoming one of the richest men in the country. During WW1 the palace sheltered Queen Maria and then it was bombed by German planes. Both Ştirbei family and Queen Maria retreated in Iaşi, and the palace was robbed by the German army, which also took it over, with the German Military Commandment settling in Buftea in January 1917. On March 5, 1918, the peace agreement with Austro–Hungary and Germany was signed in the palace. Time passed by, the German troops were defeated, the surrender peace in Buftea was canceled and Ştirbei family could return to their palace, restoring it.


The palace and all other belongings in Buftea were confiscated by the communist government after 1946 and between 1949 and 1952 it was abandoned, all valuables being stolen. The palace was however restored in 1959, being meant as a diplomatic residence and it hosted – among other important guests – Nikita Khrushchev, the leader of the U.S.S.R., when he attended the 3rd congress of the Romanian Workers’ Party in 1960. In 1964, Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej and Nikita Khrushchev signed a deal to withdraw Russian troops from Romania in the palace Once again restored after the earthquake in 1977, the former owners regained the property after 1990 following a long dispute. In 2007, a consortium of Romanian investors, Bucharest Arena, purchased the property from the descendants of Ştirbey for nine million Euro and now intend to invest at least 30 million in its renovation.