Ceausescu Palace in Bucharest. The Ceausescu Palace and the ruins of communism Why the Palace of Parliament was included in the Guinness Book of Records
The Palace of Parliament in Bucharest makes an indelible impression on everyone who sees it for the first time. This cyclopean structure has become the largest building in Europe, and in the whole world it is second in size only to the Pentagon. He also has a couple more records to his name - the heaviest and most expensive administrative building in the world.
Romanians themselves often call it the Ceausescu Palace, in memory of the dictator on whose orders it was built.
House of the People
To build the huge House of the People (that was the original name), Ceausescu ordered the demolition of a quarter of old Bucharest. A large hill was poured into the vacated space, where this colossal structure with a height of 86 m and an area of 350 thousand square meters was erected.
According to the evidence found, the idea of building such an impressive Palace came to the dictator after his visit to communist North Korea. Ceausescu arrived deeply impressed by the modern architecture of Pyongyang and firmly decided to build something similar in his native Bucharest.
The grandiose and ambitious ideas of the Romanian ruler suddenly became expedient. In 1977, Bucharest was shaken by a powerful earthquake. As a result of the natural disaster, many buildings, including administrative ones, were damaged, so the comfortable placement of the extensive government apparatus became the primary task of the capital's architects. It was then that the final decision was made to completely redevelop the city center and build a huge architectural complex, the crown of which was to be the House of the People.
New center of Bucharest
The project for the new center of the capital was carefully prepared, but before the start of work, at the behest of Ceausescu, all buildings were made in the form of life-size models and installed on the territory cleared for construction, so that the dictator could personally appreciate the beauty and harmony of the overall architectural ensemble.
The architects did a great job, despite the grand scale (the total area of the central part of Bucharest rebuilt under Ceausescu is equal to the area of the entire ancient Venice), the ensemble turned out to be not only monumental, but also very harmonious.
On a high hill, which buried many of the historical buildings of old Bucharest, lies the huge Constitution Square, spectacularly framed by slender administrative buildings.
The wide 3-kilometer Unification Boulevard, which originally bore the resounding name of Victory of Socialism, also originates here. This boulevard is often called the Romanian Champs Elysees, and historians claim that this is how Ceausescu formulated the task for city planners - so that the new main street of the city would be wider and more beautiful than the bourgeois Champs Elysees.
And in the alignment of this magnificent boulevard, right behind the Constitution Square, the very building for which this whole great Romanian construction project was started majestically rises - the stunning House of the People, later renamed the Palace of Parliament.
Palace of Parliament
Huge and heavy, it is a striking example of socialist realism architecture and looks exactly as a stronghold of a strong dictatorial power should look, kicking its people towards a bright future. Similar buildings can be found in every capital of the countries of the former socialist camp, not to mention Moscow and St. Petersburg, but only Ceausescu managed to achieve such an impressive architectural scale.
The palace has more than 1,100 rooms, and in addition to the above-ground part, there is an even more extensive underground part, going 92 meters deep. The construction took more than a million cubic meters of marble and 3.5 thousand tons of crystal, but the amount of ordinary building materials is simply impossible to calculate.
It is interesting that several hundred architects worked on the construction of the palace, and all of them, without exception, were Romanians. Construction materials were also local. Thus, the entire Palace of Parliament, from the first drawing to the last pendant on the chandelier, can be called a purely Romanian structure. Is it worth explaining that this was done, again, on the orders of the “Genius of the Carpathians”, who dreams of showing the whole world the greatness of his own country.
In total, more than 300 thousand people were employed in the construction of the Palace, who worked around the clock, in three shifts, without interruption for a single day. This was the case from the moment of laying the cornerstone of the foundation, which took place on June 25, 1984, until 1989, when a coup d’etat took place in Romania and Ceausescu was removed from his post as leader of the country.
The dictator did not have time to finish his masterpiece, and it is not finished to this day. Construction work is still ongoing on the underground levels of the building.
Today, the Palace of the Parliament houses not only the Romanian Parliament, but also the Congress Center and the Museum of Contemporary Art. Some halls are open to excursion groups during free time from events. One of the most memorable moments of such excursions is the impressive panorama of Constitution Square and Unification Boulevard, which opens from the balcony of one of the halls.
At all times, strong rulers tried to leave behind some material evidence of the greatness of their power. This is what the Egyptian pharaohs, ancient Roman emperors and monarchs of the whole world did, and the leaders of modern times were no exception. Ceausescu was controversial, but certainly one of the most striking personalities of the twentieth century, and as an extraordinary person, he left behind a unique architectural monument.
The Palace of Parliament has become the hallmark of not only Bucharest, but also the whole of Romania, so thousands of tourists come to see this miracle of architectural thought every year. Of course, most foreign visitors do not delve into the vicissitudes of Romanian history, but simply admire the grandeur of the structure, but for many generations of Romanians, the snow-white palace in the center of Bucharest will forever remain the Ceausescu Palace, no matter what its official name.
In the very center of Bucharest is the famous Ceausescu Palace, now called the Palace of Parliament. The palace occupies an entire block, its dimensions are 270 by 240 meters, and its height is 86 meters. This is the largest administrative building in the world - its area is as much as 350,000 square meters. It is also the heaviest civil administrative building in the world.
The style of the palace is reminiscent of Stalin's Empire style - it seems that the palace was built around 30-50 years, but in fact its construction began only in 1984 on the personal order of Ceausescu. “Great Conductor”, “Genius of the Carpathians”, “Spruce”, “Prince Charming”, “Navigator” (all these are epithets that Romanian writers of the communist years awarded Ceausescu) decided to build a palace in the very center of Bucharest on Sinai Hill, for which they were destroyed a fifth of the historical center of Bucharest, including many architectural monuments. In parallel with the palace, several residential buildings in the same style were built, intended for those close to Ceausescu.
In 1989, dictator Ceausescu was executed, and his palace remained partially unfinished. During today's walk we will walk through the halls of the Ceausescu Palace, go down into the unfinished basements, and also look at the ruins of administrative buildings from the communist years that still stand in Bucharest.
02. This is what the palace looks like up close - the wide street Bulevardul Unirii leads to it, which is something like an alley with fountains. We will still see the road from the upper floors of the palace.
03. The nearby blocks are occupied by residential buildings built in the same style as the palace - apartments in these houses were intended for the party leadership of communist Romania and those close to Ceausescu. What’s interesting is that some buildings are not completely completed—you can still see here and there walls made of unplastered bricks and dark gaps of unglazed windows.
04. There are lanterns installed around the palace in the same style as the palace - some are in very poor condition.
05. Close-up photo of the palace fence - the palace itself and the fence around it were built from something similar.
06. Let's go inside. The palace greets you with the coolness of its marble halls and the colossal volumes of internal spaces.
07. Bronze sconces with Romanian crystal pendants.
08. One of the meeting rooms, built like a theater - with a stage (a shot was taken from it) and several tiers of seats for spectators.
09. Chandelier under the ceiling, also Romanian crystal.
10. Railing. Ceausescu’s special pride was that all the materials from which the palace was built were Romanian. The construction of such a colossus caused a significant shortage of building materials in the country, but everyone could tell that Romania would never kneel down and buy American cement.
11. Staircase to the upper floors with bronze railings. Like many other rooms of the palace, everything here is decorated with marble - so much of it was spent on the construction of the Palace of the "Genius of the Carpathians" that in the late eighties even tombstones had to be made from other materials - marble became a terrible shortage.
12. A passage hall, in which there are now stands with national Romanian clothing, and on the left there is something like a television studio, where some politicians of modern Romania often give interviews.
13. Door handle made of bronze.
14. One of the meeting rooms.
15. Marble corridors.
16. Let's go out to the palace terrace - it is located at an altitude of about 50 meters, and it offers good views of the city.
17. On the terrace you can see the ventilation ducts of the palace.
18. And storm drains covered with metal gratings.
19. View towards the city - the street is called Bulevardul Unirii, this is the same boulevard that was laid along with the construction of the palace, destroying part of the historical city. I don’t care about history - the “Great Conductor” was supposed to contemplate the fountains in the morning.
21. And here it is - another meeting room, no longer reminiscent of a theater, but of a Catholic cathedral.
22. Do you know what amazes you most about the Navigator palace? Some kind of terrible anachronism. It’s hard to get rid of the feeling that he dreamed of such a building since his youth during the Stalinist years.
23. And if in Moscow of the 1930s such luxury and pompousness can still be somehow understood, then in Romania of the late 1980s it looks funny and absurd.
24. The palace looks like a grandmother who bought a dress in her youth, kept it in her wardrobe for 50 years and finally decided to wear it and go out - not noticing that the lace flounces now cause not envy, but a grin, and the dress itself has faded and smells like mothballs.
25. The luxury of the palace is gradually crumbling and crumbling, the cracking marble floors are bashfully covered with plaster.
26. An empty wardrobe, looking exactly the same as in some Soviet theater.
27. Toilet. The “great conductors” also went to pee from time to time.
28. In the toilet there is a balcony on which there is some kind of ancient and forgotten mop.
29. Now let's go down to the basements of the palace. A narrow technical staircase leads there, no longer decorated with marble, more reminiscent of a staircase to some kind of nuclear bunker. The basements themselves are in quite poor condition - it is clear that the palace did not have time to finish. There are gray concrete walls without finishing, some construction marks.
30. Cable routes are hidden behind one of the doors.
31. Behind the other is a construction workbench and traces of some unfinished work.
32. Heating mains and garlands of electrical cables pass through the basement.
33. There are piles of broken bricks lying in the corners.
34. And construction waste.
35. On the back side of the palace there are open sewer hatches.
36. In which, apparently, homeless people now live.
37. And a few blocks from the palace there are two unfinished administrative buildings, which began to be built along with the palace, but were never finished.
38. The buildings turned out to be unnecessary for the new Romania - they were not completed, they were simply surrounded by a high, blank fence “as is” and surveillance cameras were installed.
39. Huge colossi of the Soviet era look at the world through the empty eye sockets of window and doorways. The decor is gradually crumbling - rain and snow are doing their job.
40. Metal piles are visible in front of the buildings - probably something else was planned to be built here.
42. Rusty I-beams.
43. Modern Romanians are reluctant to remember the Ceausescu era, preferring to talk about the future rather than the past.
From communism there are ruins left here that are of little interest to anyone.
The palace is considered the world's largest civil administrative building, the largest parliament building, and also the heaviest administrative building in the world. The dimensions of the palace are 270 by 240 m. Height is 86 m. The underground part of the palace goes 92 m deep. The palace has 1100 rooms and 12 floors.
Let's find out more about it...
Photo 2. 
The reign of Nicolae Ceausescu left a deep imprint on the architecture of the city of Bucharest. Of course, one of his controversial projects is the Palace of Parliament, a gigantic creation of the former dictator of Romania.
It is alleged that during the reign of Nicolae Ceausescu, the capital of Romania, Bucharest, changed its appearance by 30-35% and, unfortunately, not always for the better. The construction of the Palace of Parliament is part of an extensive urbanization program approved by the Communist Party of Romania and begun in 1976.
They say that Ceausescu came up with the idea for this project after his visit to North Korea and a visit to the capital Pyongyang. The large-scale communist buildings of Pyongyang probably impressed the dictator and he decided to build something similar in Bucharest. In 1977, there was a strong earthquake in the city of Bucharest, which damaged many buildings, including administrative ones. This event also served as the reason for the start of a new megalomaniac construction plan new city center.
Photo 3. 
Called at that time the House of the People, and today sometimes called the Ceausescu Palace, it was conceived as the core of the new city center of Bucharest, the so-called “Civic Center”.
Around the building of the Palace of Parliament there are huge buildings of the Academy of Sciences, the Ministry of Defense of Romania, the Guest House - the current Marriott Hotel and other ministries.
And in front of the main entrance of the palace, there is a large square, the current Square of Constitutions (Piata Constitutiei), from where the long (3 km) and wide (90 meters) Boulevard of Unification begins, which during Ceausescu’s time was called “Victory of Socialism.”
In Romania, it is jokingly called the “Romanian Champs Elysees”. There is an anecdote regarding Ceausescu's megalomania that supposedly the dictator ordered his engineers and architects to build a large boulevard in front of the building, maybe in beauty it would be similar to the Champs Elysees, but most importantly, it should be wider than the Champs Elysees!
Photo 4. 
Along this long artery, the “Genius of the Carpathians” ordered the construction of the Palace of Culture, the Tribunal, the National Library, the Palace of Pioneers and Falcons of the Motherland :) and many residential high-rise buildings, high-rise buildings with a North Korean accent. A lot!
And in the center of the boulevard there are fountains, symbols of the counties of Romania, the largest fountain is on Union Square (Piata Unirea), symbolizing the capital, Bucharest.
On the site of this new microdistrict, there used to be ancient elegant quarters, medieval buildings, mansions, churches, valuable for their architectural styles. With sadness, we can mention some destroyed masterpieces of architecture: the New Princely Court, the Palace with Archives, the Mihai Voda Monastery of 1589, the Alba Postavari Church 1564, Military Museum and Army Theater, Church of St. Friday 1645, Brancoveanu Hospital 1837, Hospital and Monastery of Pantelimon 1750. One of the main and valuable monuments, barbarically destroyed is the Vacaresti Monastery (early 18th century), which many considered the personification of the Romanian medieval art, without exaggeration, one of the most beautiful monuments of the Orthodox world.
Photo 5. 
The area of the entire destroyed and rebuilt territory is equal to the city of Venice! In such a sad way, Bucharest gradually lost the title of “Little Paris” and changed its face. What fires, earthquakes and wars did not do, the leaders of that era did. And unfortunately, all this is irrevocable!
The Palace of the Parliament of the city of Bucharest was built on the highest and most earthquake-resistant place in the city of Bucharest, Spira Hill or Arsenal Hill, as it was previously called because of the military barracks located on this hill. The maximum height of the hill before construction was 18 meters, but from the side of Constitution Square the hill is artificially elevated.
Photo 6. 
The Palace of Parliament Bucharest is the second largest administrative building in the world, after the Pentagon. The building is also noted in the Guinness Book of Records as one of the most expensive administrative buildings in the world; in 2006, the cost of the building was estimated at 3 billion euros. The entire area of the Palace of Parliament occupies 330 thousand square meters and the volume is 2.5 million cubic meters, 2% more than the Cheops pyramid in Egypt.
The length of the main facade of the building is 270 meters, the side side is 240 meters. The height of the building, from the foundation to the top, is 178 meters, of which 86 meters above ground level and 92 meters underground. The built-up area above ground level is 66 thousand square meters.
Photo 7. 
To build the building they used:
1,000,000 cubic meters of marble
5,500 tons of cement
7,000 tons of steel
20,000 tons of sand
1.000 tons of sand
900,000 cubic meters of wood
3,500 tons of crystal
200,000 cubic meters of glass
2,800 candelabra
220,000 square meters of carpets
3.500 square meters of leather
Photo 8. 
By order of Ceausescu, all construction materials were only from Romania, the engineers and architects were Romanians. Allegedly, the dictator wanted to show the whole world that Romania has natural resources and that Romania is capable of carrying out even such gigantic projects.
About 300 architects and about 30 thousand workers worked on the construction of the building, 24 hours, changing in 3 shifts. All work was supervised by the chief architect of the building, a young girl, Anca Petrescu. She was 28 years old when work officially began.
According to the stories of other architects, the fact that Anca Petrescu was an obedient, modest girl from a simple peasant family, pleased Nicholas and Elena Ceausescu, who did not like intellectuals and self-confident scientists and architects, although Elena Ceausescu herself was the so-called “luminary of science” and headed the Academy Sci. Anca Petrescu tried in every possible way to please the dictator, some even began to say that she was a young relative of Elena Ceausescu (Elena’s maiden name was also Petrescu) and in the end it was she who was entrusted with such an important project, although initially, according to the plan, other architects were supposed to lead.
Photo 9. 
The ceremonial ceremony of laying the first foundation stone took place on June 25, 1984, but work actually begins already in 1980, when about 40 thousand residents were forcibly overpowered and the neighborhoods where they previously lived were razed to the ground to make way for the Palace of Parliament.
Until 1989 (the year when the revolution against Ceausescu took place) more than 3 billion Romanian lei were spent! And this was at a time when, thanks to the ill-considered economic policy and the policy of repaying the state's external debts, the standard of living of the inhabitants of Romania dropped to its lowest point. The Palace of Parliament was built mostly military, soldiers of the Romanian army. The exact number of deaths during heavy and high-risk construction work is still unknown.
Photo 10. 
The work is not 100% finished even now. Before the Revolutions, the interior decoration was completed only in a few halls; in general, the construction and interior decoration of most rooms was completed after the overthrow of the Ceausescu dictatorship.
If you look vertically, you can discern that the building is divided into three registers and looks like a pyramid but with a flat top. There are 12 floors above ground level, and 4 more underground.
The building has about 1000 rooms, of which 440 are offices, 30 halls for conferences and receptions, 4 restaurants, 3 libraries, 2 underground parking lots, a concert hall, and other service premises. The palace has 2 courtyards.
The names of the halls were chosen after 1989, most are named after famous Romanian personalities.
Photo 11. 
The building houses the Romanian Parliament, there is a large meeting room for the Deputies' Room, as well as the Senate Hall.
The Museum of Contemporary Art is also open to visitors in the Palace of Parliament.
Every year, international or national conferences, seminars, congresses, exhibitions, and negotiations are also held in the halls of the palace. The halls are rented out for numerous events.
The Palace of the Bucharest Parliament is often included in tourist routes; several halls are visited by tourists. Particularly impressive are the Unification Hall, the Hall of Human Rights, the Main Entrance and the Main Gallery. Tourists have the opportunity to go out onto the balcony of the Cuza Protocol Hall from where an interesting panorama of the Constitution Square and the “Romanian Champs Elysees” opens. Fields" Boulevard Uniriy (Associations).
Photo 12. 
Front Gallery
This is a long corridor, 150 meters, with a width of 18 meters. Divided into three parts by sliding oak doors with crystal. The ceiling is covered with gypsum plaster with colored ornaments in the Romanian Brancovan style.
The central floor, in front of the official entrance, consists of 4 types of Romanian marble: white, beige, red and black, from the area of Rusca or Moneasa. The vaults of the Front Gallery are supported by 34 octagonal columns, 17 on each side, made of white marble, with decorative ornaments.
The gallery is illuminated by natural light, 14 windows and 67 crystal candelabra. This gallery intersects with the main Official Entrance, from one of the largest squares in the city of Bucharest, Unirea Square (Piata Unirea).
Here you will also see 2 monumental staircases that lead to the Senate Hall and the Cuza Hall. Each staircase has a window with a height of 16 meters, which are covered with curtains. The weight of each curtain is 250 kg! The height of the steps is 14-16 cm, made specifically for the height of Nicholas and Elena Ceausescu, so that they do not get tired when walking up the stairs.
Photo 13. 
It is named in honor of the Prince of Wallachia and Moldova, Alexandru Cuza. This hall was to be called: the Romania hall and was intended for protocols, for negotiations and the signing of agreements at the highest level, between countries. The height of the hall is 20 meters. It is the second largest hall with an area of 2040 square meters.
Photo 14. 
Unira Hall
Intended for balls and banquets. Height 15 meters, area about 2000 sq. m.
The carpet in this hall weighs 3 tons, 1100 square meters and covers the central part of the hall, under the ceiling. The ceiling patterns are reflected on the carpet. There is a very strong echo in the hall.
Photo 15. 
Rosseti Hall
Here is the largest candelabra (chandelier?), which contains 5 tons of crystal!
Photo 16. 
Hall of Human Rights
It was intended as a meeting room for the Central Committee of the Communist Parties of Romania. The interior decoration was completed before 1989. In the center of the hall there is a large round table with original chairs for members of the Committee. The Ceausescu chair was in the stages of production at the time of the Revolutions. The beauty of the second heaviest candelabra, 3 tons of crystal, is impressive. The candelabra model is reflected on the carpet.
Photo 17. 
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Photo 20. 
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