I have skipped posting for a few days (again) and I blame Sibiu for that – it turned out to be a great city 
and with all the events going on I had no time for posting. I will try to make up for that in the next few days.
Today’s photographs show Bucharest’s Anglican Church of the Resurrection, located near Icoanei Park, at the intersection of three streets. Like many other churches in Bucharest, it has an interesting past. It was built in 1913-1914 on land given to the British Crown by the city of Bucharest. It was opened in 1920 and dedicated in 1922 by the Bishop of Gibraltar. In the early days the church was regularly attended by the Queen Marie of Romania, granddaughter of Queen Victoria, and it was due to her help that the building was completed. The church was closed during WWII from 1940 to Christmas Day 1944, a period when it was under the care of a church guardian and cleaner, also named Maria, who continued to work at the church until 1983 when at the age of 78 was forced to retire. She was later presented with the bronze cross of the Order of St. Augustine of Canterbury by the Archbishop of Canterbury. After the communists took power the church had no permanent chaplain, being served monthly by visiting priests. This situation lasted until 1966. The church’s official webpage describes the harsh conditions of the late 1980s when the church was under constant surveillance and how “the few Romanians who dared to step inside risked losing their job, their home, even their freedom”. These days the church offers English language services every Sunday. The building’s red brick facade is reminiscent of British architecture, and is the work of architect Victor Gh. Ştephănescu.
Gheorghe Lazăr High School is Bucharest’s second oldest high school, being opened in 1860. It is named after Gheorghe Lazăr, a Transylvanian-born Romanian scholar who founded the first Romanian language school in Bucharest in 1818 and whose statue was featured on this blog last January. The high school is one of the most famous in Bucharest and its location at the southeast corner of Cişmigiu park is unbeatable: what better place to go to when you’re skipping classes?
Despite its classical look, the theater building featured in today’s photo is actually not that old. Its former name should give away its approximate age. Until 20 years ago it was called “The Unity Among People Cultural House”. Does that ring a bell? It was build in 1953, during the first years of the communism regime, by architect Nicolae Porumbescu. These were the first years of communism in Romania and the style condoned by the regime was called “socialist realism“, the official artistic movement of the Soviet Union. The socialist realism required an artificial return to the classical theme, away from the modernist tendencies of the day. After the 1989 revolution the theater housed “The Mask” theater company (Teatrul Masca in Romanian) which later moved to another venue while this one is awaiting renovation (for quite some time now, but than I guess it’s not easy to gather the money to renovate it).
Krikor Zambaccian (1889 – 1962) was a wealthy Armenian businessman and a lover of fine arts, who over the course of his life assembled a great art collection. În 1930 he asked architect C.D. Galin to design a house that will be used as living quarters as well as a museum for the art collection. In 1942 when the house was ready, Zambaccian opened his collection for public view once a week. The Zambaccian Museum was inaugurated in 1947 when Zambaccian donated his collection and the house to the Romanian state. The donation papers included the condition that the collection will remain in the house but in 1977 after the big earthquake the communist state moved the collection to the Art Collections Museum, citing imaginary concerns about the building’s structure. În 1992, after the fall of communism, the collection was returned to the house and the museum reopened. Most of the works are by Romanian artists (Nicolae Grigorescu, Ioan Andreescu, Ştefan Luchian, Jean Al. Steriadi, Gheorghe Petraşcu, Nicolae Tonitza, Nicolae Dărăscu, Theodor Pallady, Iosif Iser, Corneliu Baba, to name a few) starting with mid-19th century to the mid-20th century. There are also a few paintings by French artists like Delacroix, Renoir, Pissarro, Sisley, Cézanne etc. When I visited there were only 5 or 6 more visitors, so it feels like having the place to yourself. I can only imagine how it was to be living there.
Ceauşescu’s regime left Bucharest with many dark legacies incluging his Civic Center project which I mentioned before on this blog. Many buildings intended to be part of this new image of Bucharest were unfinished when the communists were forced to give up power at the end of 1989. Some of the buildings were completed later, but the one in today’s reflection did not share their fate. This massive edifice which is supposed to be the new house of the National Library collection is still half way to being ready. Work on the building stopped in 1986, even though the building was supposed to be ready in 1989. Finally, more than 20 years later, work was restarted last year and these day we can see it progressing slowly.
Today’s photograph shows a bank building on Lipscani, facing the National Bank of Romania. The books on the architecture of Bucharest that I consulted list it as being built in 1910 – 1913, but sources I found on the web say the building was most probably built before 1900. The architect is unknown. The building served as the headquarters of the General Romanian Bank, which was a branch of Gesselschaft and Bleichröder Bank (thanks to Bucharestian for this information). It was restored during the communist regime in 1983-1984 and for a while served as a shopping mall. I remember buying shoes there once. Today it’s being used as a bank again.
The beautiful palace which is the subject of today’s photo was built in 1902-1906 as a residence for Elena Kretzulescu (aka Elena Creţulescu) by architect Petre Antonescu (1873-1965). It replaced the old family house, which was built around 1718. The palace’s facade is aligned with Ştirbei Vodă Street while the back looms over Cişmigiu Park from a small hill. Purchased in 1927 by city hall, the building was used for various purposes: from 1928-1929 it housed the office of the Prime Minister, followed by the Museum of Religious Art which was closed in 1946 when the communists came to power. Since 1972 the palace has been the seat of UNESCO European Centre for Higher Education. As with many other palaces in Bucharest the architectural style is Eclectic with touches of French Renaissance, which was very much in fashion in Bucharest at the end the 19th century.
The back of the palace seen from Cişmigiu park:
The watchtower in today’s photo was used in the old times as an observation tower by the city’s firemen. Back then, the 42 meters (137,7 feet) tall tower was the highest structure in the city. It was built in 1890-1892 after plans by architect George Mandrea, to replace the old fire tower, Colţei Tower, demolished two years earlier in 1888. The tower was also supposed to serve as a water reservoir in case of fire, being equipped with a reservoir and a metal frame in the upper section. The problem was that after finishing the structure they realized that the water pumps of the local water utility company did not have enough power to fill the tower with water. This problem was solved in 1924 with the inauguration of a new water plant but by that time it was no longer necessary as the city’s water network had been developed. The fire brigade remained in the building until 1935, even though starting with 1910 the use of a tall building was made obsolete by the introduction of the telephone. The building served different purposes until 1963 when it became the Firefighters Museum.
