H03N1a

Katholieke Universiteit Leuven

Prof. K. Shannon

The Palace of Mogoșoaia

Bucharest, Romania

Bogdan Nicolae Voinea

0778001
Master in Engineering Sciences: Architecture
2019-2020

1/13
2/13
 Fig. 1 Lake view towards the Palace

The end of the 17th century marks a beginning in the Romanian landscape design, the time
when important parks and gardens were created, which unfortunately are known only from
summary descriptions and scattered written sources. Graphic documents, engravings,
drawings, paintings are very rare from this time (Ion 2002).
Prince Constantin Brancoveanu (1654-1714), a man of great culture, continues the glorious
tradition started by Serban Cantancuzino, and builds numerous palaces and mansions
scattered throughout the country. The new rich architectural style that bears his name,
interweaving the old Romanian traditions with many valuable elements of Italian and Ottoman
architecture, brings the western principles of composition and design of Late Renaissance into
the Romanian principalities, as the political conjecture offers the country a broader openness
towards Occident. The pinnacle of the Brancovan style can arguably be said that is in the Royal
Palace of Mogosoaia, built between 1698 and 1702. The walls surrounding the palace enclose a
genuine leisure garden and the picturesque palace, situated on the shore of a natural lake,
surrounded by terraces and finely arranged plantations. The main principles that governs the
concept of the Renaissance villa are imported by Brancoveanu into the local cultural context
and implements them firstly in the palace of Potlogi, as an experimental prototype, and
secondly in the palace of Mogosoaia.

3/13
 Fig.2 Aerial perspective over the entire ensemble

So far, there are not known contemporary graphic documents, paintings or plans, which would
allow an appreciation of the landscape achievements of the time. But they seem to be
particularly interesting from the impressions of the witnesses of the time. An English lord
named Paget, who visits the country in 1703, speaks of the existence, near the royal palace in
Bucharest, of two gardens, one large and one small, rich in shade and greenery. As well as a
personal little garden of the lady, full of flowers, a small pond and a tower completing the decor
(Marcus 1958). The creation of this separate garden for the lady reminds of the oriental
traditions that isolated the women from the public activity of the court as much as possible.
Anton Maria Del Chiaro, the personal Venetian secretary of the prince, talking about the palace
in Mogosoaia, says about the garden that it was quite beautiful, in a square shape, after the
good Italian taste, with a beautiful kiosk surrounded by flowers. Ionescu Gion notes that the
royal park had two foreign gardeners, Jean and Gerard, both of French origin (Cantacuzino
1977).
On the way to Targoviste, on the Colentina river, 12 km north of Bucharest, where the river
takes the form of an elongated lake, stands the old palace. If the architecture of the palace and
some of the annexes is largely original, the park underwent several changes and restorations
between 1870 and 1948. The park is composed of two large units: the garden within the old
walls with terraces to the lake and the rest of the park, including the lake shore opposite the
palace. The enclosure is treated in the Renaissance spirit, with a clear influence of the Venetian
gardens. This is not accidental, as the Venetian architect Domenico Rupolo collaborated in the
restoration work of 1870 (Marcus 1958). The rest of the park has been designed similar to the
English picturesque landscape.

4/13
 Fig.3 Plan of the Palace’s garden

The arrangement of the garden around the constructions begins with the road that connects
with the way to Targoviste, a road that is shaded by the impressive silhouettes of a row of old
chestnuts. This motif can be traced back to the antiquity. The establishment of a system of
paved roads planted with trees for shade and wind protection is linked to the Roman landscape
design, and is efficient still to this day (Girot 2016, 92-113).

Fig.4 The entrance alley

5/13
To the left of the road, in the middle of a lawn, stands the church and to the right, a rose garden.
It has a rectangular shape and is bordered on two sides by the wall of the kitchen and the one
that divides it from the orchard. The garden is drawn geometrically, two perpendicular alleys
intersect in a small square marked by a Brancovan style column.

Fig. 5 The rose garden

What makes this garden particularly appealing is, on the one hand, the simplicity and elegance
of the elements that compose it, and on the other, the harmony created by its shapes and
colors. The thin, almost pink, brick walls, the pleasant line of the old kitchen with shingle roof,
the brick paved alleys, the neat line of the hedge of trimmed buxus and the bluish juniper
pyramids give charm to this garden. The geometry of the garden is reaching far beyond the
terraces of the villa itself, incorporating a line of sight that projects and directs. Here, as the
visitor gazes out across the landscape, nothing is left to chance (Girot 2016, 144-171).

Fig.6 View towards the enclosed garden and the entrance façade of the Palace
6/13
Entering the enclosure through the tower, the visitor places himself in front of a rectangular
garden followed by the palace. The enclosed garden, so specific for the Renaissance, was a
Classical reference for the landscape design of the 16th century Italy , being developed by their
Roman predecessors. During the early empire, the Roman nobility started to build their villas
around larger courtyards, which thus became private spaces of repose. The gardens and villas
of Pompeii bear witness to the development of the enclosed garden, or hortus conclusus, as was
called. In the gardens of Pompeii, this new form of landscape, defined by formal geometry and
abstract symbolism replaced the natural, pastoral aesthetic inherited from the early Romans.
Even though the gardens, in all their exoticism and refinement, had never before harmonized
so successfully with domestic architecture, they nonetheless represent a foreign idea of nature,
imported from the Orient (Girot 2016, 92-113). Intended or not, the primordial origin of the
enclosed garden seems to ‘close the circle’ and draws back the attention to the dual nature of
the Romanian culture of the 17th-18th century, a bridge between East and West.
The strength of the enclosure is that the plantation was designed so that its elements enhance
the monument. Only a few flowers are planted, the lawn is interrupted only at the corners of
hedges of buxus, some small trees were placed near the wall of the orchard, only on the left
appears the green-blue silhouette of a specimen of juniper of Virginia. The richness of greenery
tempers itself and subordinate to the major architectural element: the palace (Marcus 1958).
The sensuality of the exotic plantations that so vividly delighted the Roman counterpart (Girot
2016, 92-113), does not belong to the contemporary cultural climate, deeply accustomed to the
Christian philosophy. Unlike examples in Roman times, the Renaissance garden was not
primarily about lust, but rather about the juxtaposition of primeval chaos with orderly gardens
shaped by reason (Girot 2016, 144-171).

Fig. 7 View towards the terraced garden and loggia façade of the Palace

7/13
The forever-present element in the Romanian vernacular architecture, the pridvor or the porch,
is amplified in the Brancovan architecture, becoming the loggia, the important piece of the
palace. It is a salon open to the garden terraces, which by architectural detail and plantations
constitute an extension of the palace rooms that incrementally steps down towards the surface
of the water (Marcus 1958). The idea of the terraced garden with all-encompassing views,
distantly relates to the ancient concept of the hanging gardens (Girot 2016, 92-113).
The parterres of iris flowers extends to a row of lilac that blocks the view towards the lake,
with the intention of a surprise effect. An opening in the row guides the visitor to a perspective
towards the lake.
During Brancoveanu, it was the first time when perspectival projection was used for designing
landscapes. Perspective constituted a definite break from the centripetal order that had been
established during the Middle Ages, instead describing a dynamic that expanded outwards
towards the infinite horizon. This enabled the Renaissance garden to become an expression of
the highest artistic, scientific and philosophical meaning (Girot 2016, 144-171). Perspectival
projection constituted a core theme in the landscape narrative, with results that were precise,
directive and effective, as we can see in the example of Mogosoaia. The abstract trajectory,
beginning with the road, through the tower-gate, to the palace and, afterwards, to the lake,
inscribes a series of focal points of constructed perspective that guides the visitor through this
almost procession path.

Fig.8 The parterres of the terraced garden

8/13
 Fig. 9 The parterres after 1870 restoration

The passage to the large park is through an alley that leads in front of a corner pavilion. From
there, the alleys begin to snake among groups of trees planted to mimic the wilderness of the
forest. The ‘chaotic’ state of the surrounding park raises the tension with the geometrically-
controlled, walled garden. The motif was implemented for the first time in Villa Adriana, where
extensive olive groves surrounded the palace, placing the archaic, pastoral symbolism of the
early Romans in contradiction with new influences from the East (Girot 2016, 92-113). The
concept is restored during Renaissance when the villas became also responsible for
transformations in the surrounding landscape, embodying an entire country estate, not only
the house itself, with its composite parts held in balance by a common topology. For instance,
the garden of the Villa Medici at Castello took the form of a Classical hortus conclusus with
golden-section proportions, backed by a wild wood or macchia. The hilltop wood is reminiscent
of the forest, the difference being that it was planted and staged entirely for the benefit of the
garden. What we find is a contrast between rugged wilderness and a design representing order
and purpose, it is a micro cosmos of precision meant to draw us away from bestiality and lust
towards the path of structured reason (Girot 2016, 144-171).

9/13
 Fig.10 Plan of the Park

As in Villa Medici, the park outside the walls of Mogosoaia is an integral part of the garden
design, forming a necessary rustic counterpoint to the refined clarity of the geometrically-
designed square garden. Here we see the two landscape archetypes- the forest and the walled
garden- juxtaposed with one another but never quite mixing, in an arrangement that recalls the
presence of divine order into the evil chaos.
In what appears to have been a conscious design, the 'evil' woodland is mostly to the left of the
central axis as one crosses the estate. As we know, the word 'left' translates as sinistra in
Italian, reflecting old superstitions about the 'sinister' side of things. The Italian Renaissance
garden thus represents an elaborate construct in which nature must be tamed for the purpose
of humankind (Girot 2016, 144-171).
This kind of intervention paved the way towards the first English picturesque gardens,
although the attitude towards nature underwent a complete reversal in the meantime (Girot
2016, 144-171). And so, we can follow a justified formal continuation with the park’s
restoration from the late 19th century.
As in the spirit of the time, the park alleys unfold undulating and crosses the whole estate,
gradually discovering, through its twists, the most interesting aspects of the landscape. The
groups of trees are placed open in the middle of lawns, being emphasized by the contrast
between their color and that of the background vegetation on which they are projected. Various
groups of conifers are placed in front of open-leaf deciduous trees, groups of chestnuts are
detached on a willow background and flat trees are projected on a pine curtain. An entire
scenery reveals itself to the viewer as he walks by (Ion 2002).

10/13
 Fig. 11 View from the Park

As innovative as it was in its time, the garden of Mogosoaia became a turning point in the
history of Romanian landscape design. The evolution of the discipline in the three hundred
years passed from its creation has brought new challenges for today’s professionals.
The purpose and the tools of working with the landscape has changed. The target of the
Mogosoaia design was to embody an abstract, idealistic form of beauty, expressing an eternal
truth as it was perceived at that time, regarding the appreciation of foreign or local elites, and
trying to ensure the belonging of Bucharest to the European civilization. Nowadays, the socio-
political and environmental context has changed the interest of the discipline. The
professionals are set to solve issues of a more practical nature regarding the landscape as
floods, landslides, drought, pollution, etc. The practice of Batlle i Roig studio is an example of
this kind. Their work at the Garraf Waste Landfill, for instance, is as innovative and relevant to
the present, by taking attitude and repairing the harmful human actions of the past onto the
environment, as Mogosoaia might have been in its time. Although the concept of renaturation
of the landscape closer to its initial state was far from the philosophy of the 18th century, the
Mogosoaia park did improve the quality of the landscape from agricultural land to a woodland.

11/13
The social dimension of the present profession has changed either. Practitioners have the
responsibility to use their tools to bring people together, to facilitate social and civic life, to
emancipate the society and so on. Marti Franch from EMF studio speaks about the idea that, by
bringing people together, through the built or arranged environment, you encourage them to
form stronger communities, as he actually did with the Germanetes Public Space. By drawing a
parallel with Mogosoaia, its success consisted in another social challenge. By its cultural import,
the Mogosoaia ensemble opened up Romanian principalities to the western civilization and
emancipated the local elites.
My conclusion is that the Palace of Mogosoaia has stood up in time as an early masterpiece of
the Romanian landscape design and that its legacy remains relevant up to this day.

Fig. 12 Palace view from the opposite bank of the lake

12/13
Bibliography
Cantacuzino, George Matei. 1977. Izvoare si Popasuri. Bucharest: Editura Eminescu.
Girot, Christophe. 2016. 4.Of Villas and Woods, The course of landscape architecture: A History of our
Designs on the Natural World, from Prehistory to the Present. London: Thames & Hudson.
Girot, Christophe. 2016. 6.Gardens of Perspective, The course of landscape architecture: A History of
our Designs on the Natural World, from Prehistory to the Present. London: Thames & Hudson.
Ion, Narcis Dorin. 2002. Mogosoaia : Trei secole de istorie : 1702 - 2002. Bucharest: Eforie - grup
Tritonic.
Marcus, Rica. 1958. Parcuri si Gradini in Romania. Bucharest: Editura Tehnica.

Image References

Fig.1, 6 - https://undesamerg.com/viziteaza/Palatul-Mogosoaia
Fig.2 - https://relevee.uauim.ro/532/
Fig.3, 9, 10 - Marcus, Rica. 1958. Parcuri si Gradini in Romania. Bucharest: Editura Tehnica.
Fig.4, 5, 8, 11 - https://www.infoghidromania.com/foto-palatul-mogosoaia.html
Fig.7 - http://www.imperialtransilvania.com/ro/citeste-stirea/argomenti/places-of-interest-
1/articolo/complexul-cultural-mogosoaia.html
Fig.12 -https://www.9am.ro/top/Incredibil/296364/imagini-fabuloase-din-romania-bunicilor-
nostri-cum-arata-tara-noastra-in-1931/1/Ciobani-din-Novaci.html

13/13