25 YEARS IN THE SERVICE OF ROMANIAN HERITAGE AND COMMUNITIES
Circular Catalysts – Residency Journal

Circular Catalysts – Residency Journal

Craftsmen’s Day

The adventure of materials and colours from nature starts with British designer Anoushka Cole. One can reach Câmpulung through the filter of wonderful local craftsmen.

For this project we chose to visit one of the most appreciated weaving craftswomen in the country, Mrs Mariea Plopeanu. We were greeted not only with a museum of items woven by Mrs Plopeanu and her mother, but also with carefully researched, traded, rescued and selected items from all over the Muscel basin, up to 200 years old. Local patterns and materials, gold and silver threads and various stories accompany each woven piece, along with a sincere love for this craft and, ultimately, lifestyle.

 

We were welcomed especially warmly and with surprising stories by one of the last wool artisans in the country. At Emilian Catrinescu, wool is washed, carded and spun into yarns dedicated to industry or various individual orders. Highly sought-after services, he can’t keep up with demand.

Câmpulung Festive Day

How could we better capture the local specificity of a city like Câmpulungul if not by a stroll around the city?

From the newly restored Negru Voda Monastery to the Town Hall we enjoyed an impressive architectural landscape and told the past, present and future scenarios for this town. We were greeted by abundant information at the Museum of Ethnography and sat the rest of the day around the Golescu Villa preparing for the experiments and workshops of the days to come.

Joining us for our debates, preparations and explorations was Mr. Andrew Glass from the British Council, whom we told all about our plans for this intense week.

Fruits of nature harvest day

We set out to be inspired by the local tangible and intangible cultural heritage, while using the surrounding nature as the main element in obtaining natural pigments, making blockprinting patterns and printing flower leaves and petals directly onto materials.

That’s why we dedicated most of the day to a foraging expedition in the hills of Lerești with our guide and local specialist Selena (Corina-Elena Diță). A connoisseur of edible plants, mushrooms and the stories that accompany the hills at the foot of the Păpușa Iezer mountains, Selena helped us to fill our “forage bags” with a great many seasonal plants, such as: crocus, violas, scarlet elf cup, strobilurus mushroom, wild strawberries, Easter flower, busculite, moss, dog’s tooth violet, hairy wood-rush, coltfoot, star of Bethlehem, cherry bark, dried ferns, cones or walnuts.

The rest of the day was eminently busy around the pots, since we chose to boil wool, flax, silk and cotton in a solution of nettle, spruce cone, fern, red onion, maple and cherry bark.

Magic day in the kitchen

We aimed to have a whole day dedicated to various plant and plant-inspired painting techniques.

Boiling natural materials in various herbal solutions – this was already started the day before and completed on ready-made textiles. Linen tableware was given the colour of spruce cone and nettle, and the silk shawl was taken to the light earthy colour of dried fern.

The hammer technique –it marked the final linen materials, in musical rhythms and with some force, with traces of: rose hips, greater celandine, dwarf periwinkle and forsythia picked directly from the dendrological park of the Golescu Villa. One of the experiments I even kept with the pressed, unpicked flowers and leaves as part of the creative process.

The roll-wrapping technique – used for the linen and silk all with plants from the home garden left to steep and soak for a long time: greater celandine, dwarf periwinkle, blackberry flowers and forsythia.

Block printing – inspired by the colours and shapes of nature we accessed the linocut technique to create repeating patterns on linen tablecloths and kitchen towels. Leaves, mushrooms and geese(!) remained printed on the textiles as traces of the places we explored.

 

Community Day

Around 30 children and adults joined the Pro Patrimonio team on Saturday to close the project with a final community experiment.

With the plants and inspiration provided by the Golescu Villa garden, the children brought to life a giant 5m long tablecloth. They hammered, sewed, made wool cottons, attached plant materials and then decorated the whole thing at the end with their own stamp made in linoleum.

Music, snacks and merriment accompanied the whole; we ended the adventure with some outdoor soup and a wood fire animation.

 

 


The residency in Câmpulung Muscel is part of the Circular Catalysts project carried out by the British Council Romania, in partnership with the Romanian Cultural Institute. This is a programme designed to generate new collaborations between designers, artists and craftspeople from Romania and the UK and to facilitate fertile conversations around sustainable production practices and processes.

Other events in the project:

Rezidenţă Circular Catalysts la Vila Golescu

Pro Patrimonio exhibition within Circular Catalysts. Romanian Design Week 2023

Circular Catalysts – Residency Journal

Heritage Education. Pro Patrimonio Strategic Programme

Heritage Education. Pro Patrimonio Strategic Programme

01.03.2023

The Future Acceleration Program has entered its fourth year of collaboration and is the flagship intervention of the UiPath Foundation, carried out in Botoșani and Olt counties, with the support of Pro Patrimonio. Through this programme, 70 children from five communities in the proximity of Enescu House and Neamțu Manor benefit from an integrated support package – monthly scholarships, weekly classes in Romanian language and literature, mathematics and English, clothes, school supplies, books, games, food packages, digital equipment, camps – and participate in various activities to develop digital skills and non-formal education.

The Children’s Music Academy is a Pro Patrimonio Foundation Program, continuously run at the George Enescu House in Mihăileni, through which 28 secondary school children benefit from weekly music education lessons in the community. They are currently studying their second instrument, the xylophone, after starting with the flute. Through this programme, the children develop their creativity, artistic sensitivity, practical skills and instrument technique, meet musicians who come to the residencies, and are exposed to a wider culture.

The Heritage Caravan features a series of workshops on a variety of themes, aimed at education and direct learning, through experimentation and creativity, about architectural heritage, memory, local identity, relationships between people, buildings and cultural values. The current stops of the caravan are mainly the communities around the architectural monuments we are dealing with, but the system can be replicated so that more and more children gain a better understanding of where they live, local identity and universal connections, and gain a sustainable perspective in regarding heritage and how it can be exploited. 

 

 

 

Donate for heritage education

Call for participation

Call for participation

In the framework of the project “Forgotten Texts – Historical Plasterwork. Research and practical studies for repair and maintenance”, in order to carry out a study that will be relevant and useful at the national level, among architects and builders dealing with the repair, restoration and refurbishment of historic buildings, Pro Patrimonio expresses its intention and need to collaborate with three broad categories of organisations:

  1. Suppliers and manufacturers of building materials in order to find out information about products and materials that can be considered for the repair of different plasters and textures, compatible materials for restoration to be tested and analysed, technical advice for the use of the products provided;
  2. Contractors and beneficiaries with sites in progress, with a preference for historic building facades. In this case, technical information from restoration sites working on plasterwork is needed and to be able to receive the project team to observe the solutions adopted and how to work or to allow experimentation and testing of recipes 1.
  3. Public institutions and administrations, town halls and county directorates of culture to facilitate access to information. At the end of the project all these data will be able to be included in the specifications.

1 Pro Patrimonio reserves the right to choose from the wide range of deterioration only a few that will be investigated as most frequent and serious.

To facilitate the collection of this data please fill in this Google Form or send an email to propatrimonio.romania@gmail.com by 28 February 2023.

 “Forgotten Texts – Historical Plasterwork. Research and practical studies for repair and maintenance” is a project carried out by Pro Patrimonio Foundation, supported by the Romanian Order of Architects through the Architecture Stamp Tax and PSC Group.

Resources

2023 Project

Historical plasterwork: Practical research. Stage II

2019 Project

Forgotten Textures: Inter-war Bucharest

Forgotten Textures: Inter-war Bucharest. Plastering Recipe Book, Pro Patrimonio 2019/ second edition, 2021

SOS patrimoniul. Intervenții civice

Recipes / Maria Cantili Golescu. The expanded notebook.

Recipes / Maria Cantili Golescu. The expanded notebook.

Starting from the original manuscript turned digital „Recettes de Cuisine”, after it was transcribed, translated, explained and tested, we arrived at the form of a contemporary adapted editorial product called “Recipes”, Maria Cantili Golescu.

Maria Cantili Golescu’s culinary notebook contains 144 pages of “kitchen” recipes and household tips, to which she has added a final 8-page table of contents. On the first page, Maria began her notebook with the following words:

Recettes de Cuisine etc.

Paris, 21 January 1900

19 Avenue Bosquet

Marie, E. Cantilli

On the page before the title page, she wrote down her measuring units in the Anglo-Saxon system, translating them into metric approximations:

16 drame = 1 uncie
16 uncii = 1 livră
1 quart = 1 litru
1 pint = 1/2 litri
1 gill = 1/8 litri
1 uncie = 30 g

It is important to go through this material understanding that she did not write her notebook with the intention of ever publishing it – it was not intended to be an original cookbook, but a support in her own kitchen. As was the custom (carried on from previous generations and carried forward), each housewife gathered her more elaborate recipes for main courses, sauces, desserts, preserves, etc. from various sources: received from other housewives/cooks or copied from magazines and cookbooks, less accessible in those days.

By 1900, a limited number of gastronomic books had been published in Wallachia and Moldavia and not all households had access to them. In addition, as was the fashion across the continent, French cuisine had become the guiding light for anyone with gourmet pretensions. It was therefore desirable to have on hand a collection of French recipes suitable for any occasion.

When she started her diary, Maria had just turned 19. She had just received as gift from the Central Stationery Shop at 113 Rue St. Dominique (now a clothing store) a notebook with cloth-covered card covers and lined dictation-style sheets. The cover had been personalized with her initials – “MC” (we reproduced the monogram on the cover of our notebook). Over the next year, she meticulously jotted down her various recipes in French, English, German and (one) Romanian, filling every page to the last.

 

These dishes include a rich range of dishes, soups, drinks, desserts, doughs, ice creams, suitable to be served at different times of the day both at everyday meals and at the most festive for guests. Housekeeping tips (how to clean flannel, silverware, leather, lace, etc., how to prepare holiday decorations, and more) come in turn, interspersed among the food recipes. The approximate order is established at the end, when she reviews the course of the whole notebook, notes the page numbers and composes a table of contents referring to the pages where they can be found.

The recipes are often written with few explanations, as was the practice. It was assumed that the person reading them had sufficient knowledge in the art of cooking to intuit the steps required. Sometimes, for example, he omits to say “put it in the oven” – whoever cooked from this notebook would have understood by itself. The shortest of the recipes is dispatched in a few words: Pie dough. 250 g flour, 150 g butter, 30 g sugar, 1 whole egg, 1 yolk. No further explanation. Others, are described in detail: the pastry dough exceeds two pages.

We added explanations notes where I considered them necessary. These may regard ingredients that are less commonly used today, or historic ones that have been lost from consumption or trade. Also, where the method of preparation seems incomprehensible to the contemporary reader, we have provided explanations detailing the context: until the early part of the 20th century, sugar could come in the form of solid lumps/cups from which you would crush and mash as much as you needed; another example relates to the cooling methods of the time (in the cellar, with ice, with salt etc). Some recipes indicate the use of hearth-type ovens, others a primitive type of cooking machine, such as those with a griddle – but all the dishes described can be adapted with a little imagination to today’s technology.

22 dishes from the 1900s recreated by contemporary chefs and culinary authors

At the end of the notebook we have included a limited series of recipes photographed and explained at length, drawing on the creativity of several chefs and culinary authors who have leafed through Maria Cantili’s notebook from 1900-1901, selected a number of recipes from it and recreated them in the conditions of a contemporary kitchen. They have brought them up to date, following their personal inspiration and style. Below, you can follow the 22 dishes, starting with the original recipe at the top of each page, accompanied by detailed explanations of the ingredients and preparation process.

We would also like to thank all those involved in the production of this material, chefs and culinary authors: Andrei Chelaru, Oana Coantă, Cosmin Dragomir, Irina Georgescu, Cristina Mehedințeanu, Mara Elena Oană, Mădălina Roman, Alex Petricean, Horia Simon, Adriana Sohodoleanu and Adela Trofin; to the coordinator and editor Mona Petre who contributed two recipes, to the translators Nona Henți and Aura Pandele; Mirela Duculescu for editorial advice and the staff of the Golești Museum in Ștefănești (AG), represented by Cristina Boțoghină, for providing some unknown details about the life of Maria Cantili Golescu.

 

 

We invite you to consult the expanded notebook in the library of useful resources of the foundation here

 

RECIPES, OBJECTS AND EXPERIMENTS.  A project inspired by Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary from 1900.

RECIPES, OBJECTS AND EXPERIMENTS. A project inspired by Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary from 1900.

We have gathered three seasons of research, trials and experiments in the fields of heritage education, object design and last but not least of culinary experience.

Maria Cantili Golescu’s culinary diary opens up a whole world of inspiration of bourgeois families in the 1900s, with spicy details of a lifestyle that naturally and playfully blends local and European influences, and invites biographical research into a female character from the Golescu family who has not had the chance to be much in the spotlight of historical stories.

Extras caiet Maria Cantili Golescu

So we want to share with the inhabitants of Câmpulung, with friends, collaborators and curious people from all over the world the sophisticated culinary discoveries in this notebook written in Romanian, English, French and German, to learn together how to clean hat feathers, how to waterproof the soles of shoes or how to make rice glue…like in 1900. We want to stroll through the ladies’ wardrobe of that period, follow the Golescu family’s genealogical thread, explore Mrs Cantili’s kitchen objects, taste the culinary experiments of the time and immerse ourselves musically and visually in the aristocratic atmosphere of 100 or so years ago.

How so?

Through an informal country party on October 1st in the courtyard of the Golescu Villa in Câmpulung Muscel!

The programme is packed with content but approachable:

11:00

– Those who have not yet tried our Berechet architectural tour of the city are invited from 11am to pick up their treasure hunt maps and quietly enjoy the beautiful city of Câmpulung

– This year we are also inaugurating a prototype of a culinary map of the city that we invite you to explore and even complete with suggestions and preferences.

14:00

– Opening event in the courtyard of the Golescu Villa: a short history of the project and a short guide to explore the site

14:00-18:00

–           Fill the afternoon with music and vintage visual sequences, local snacks, exhibitions and launches of all kinds.

  • Launch of the Maria Cantili Golescu Recipe Booklet with 22 historical recipes rewritten by contemporary culinary experts.
  • Launch of the new Honest Goods #2 collection, inspired by Maria Cantili Golescu’s recipes, objects and lifestyle
  • Exhibition of art installations dedicated to Maria Cantili Golescu and made by the children from Câmpulung during the summer heritage workshops: culinary tour of the garden, clothing exhibition, family tree of the Golescu family, old culinary objects and practical tips from 1900
  • Exhibition of portraits of Maria Cantili Golescu
  • Visitors can try out three do-it-yourself workshops in calligraphy, linocutting and family tree building

18:00-19:00 – Cantili recipe competition with prizes

We invite cooks and amateurs alike to try preparing a recipe from the book and enter it in a competition judged by the participants by tasting.

We invite you to choose from the extensive cookbook: https://www.propatrimonio.org/maria-cantili-golescu-retete-de-bucatarie/

We suggest sweet or savoury dishes that do not require heating and can be sliced or shared for the whole audience to taste.

19:00-20:00 – Movie night

Party preparations and suggestions:

  • Look for an old and interesting recipe at home that you can leave as a memento in your calligraphy table exercise book.
  • Spice up your casual garden attire with a vintage item that complements the 1900s atmosphere suggested by Maria Cantili Golescu. Basic attire should also include warm evening clothes. We suggest: șuba (shepherd’s wool cloak), pearls and boots, to check all criteria.
  • Those who would like to participate, don’t forget the competition preparation!

 

“Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary-recipes, tastes, objects and experiments” is a cultural project of Pro Patrimonio Foundation co-financed by AFCN.

Media partners: Scena 9, Rock FM, Muscel TV, Zeppelin Magazine; Friend project: Ierburi Uitate

The digitized booklet, “Recettes de Cuisine”, can be found in the Foundation’s library of useful resources here 

The extended booklet here

 

 


Read more

Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary – Recipes, Tastes, Objects and Experiments. Press Release.

Standerul de haine cu garderoba Mariei Cantili Golescu şi alte poveşti

„Recettes de Cuisine”, caietul digitalizat 

Girdle, ustensilă istorică de gătit 

Zece Experimente Contemporane din Jurnalul Culinar Maria Cantili Golescu 

Ansamblul Golescu. Observator de Peisaj Cultural în Câmpulung Muscel 

Ansamblul Golescu. Trasee botanice în Parcul Golescu 

Honest Goods. Colecţia Golescu

”The story of my city” – Workshop Diary from the Enescu House

”The story of my city” – Workshop Diary from the Enescu House

During the five days of the Heritage Caravan workshops at the Enescu House in Mihăileni together with the team of children involved we researched the subject “How do we discover and creatively tell stories about the place we live in?” We had very intense work days, but with much satisfaction at the end for both the children and the inhabitants of Mihăileni.

The first day was dedicated to establishing the clues for Mihăileni. Each of the 22 participating children from the village earned one of the Mihăileni clues, “fought” as a warm-up for the history fragments by participating in fun and sporty team games. The elements of the village were then redrawn by the children in the context of history and the future they themselves imagine.

All these elements were then put together in a DIY frame book by the children, through which they learned an ancient Japanese bookbinding technique. The creations and other complementary textiles were finally personalised with linocut stamps.

Outdoor games and board games rounded off the autumn-tempered afternoon at the Enescu house.

The second day of workshops followed the theme and resource already developed last year in the Enescu Workbook – available in the Foundation’s free resource library. The previously created “on foot” route round Mihăileni was brought to life this year with a dynamic circuit with marker posts and interactive panels at the most interesting points of the village.

The children have worked hard to create four complex panels dedicated to the past, present and future of the Enescu House, the Zahacinski Museum, the former Town Hall and the Ceramics Factory.

The other destinations of Mihăileni were thus enriched with small wooden signposts to be mounted on the site.

On the third day we received new friends. Actress Irina Artenii defied the tiring Bucharest-Mihăileni distance and came for a short but intense workshop. The children got behind the curtains and played in like young actors. The end of the games gathered all the energies in a series of mini skits with secrets they couldn’t seem to get enough of.

The shadow theatre in the second part of the workshops was not only a new and novel experience for everyone but also an opportunity to create our models for the following day’s filming.

There was much laughter and applause at the end of the four teams’ scenes.

Getting ready, editing and filming!

The most excitement was probably reserved for this day, the fourth of the educational workshops in Mihăileni. With minimal training by our friend Alin Iacob and some home-made exercises, the four team coordinators became for one day directors and responsible for editing four short films with the enthusiastic teams of child actors, already prepared the day before for the audience and the camera.

Each of the four chosen locations — the George Enescu House, the Former Town Hall, the Zahacinski Museum and the Ceramics Factory — were creatively, playfully and amusingly told from the perspective of the past, the present and the future imagined by the children themselves.

Costumes were assembled, metaphors were written, recordings of voices, music and old objects collected by the children, all to tell the story of a series of places we all want to continue living for the benefit of the community.

All the videos can be accessed online on the Pro Patrimonio Foundation’s You Tube channel as well as next to each storyboard created by the children, via an attached QR code.

MUZEUL ZAHACINSKI din Mihăileni

CASA ENESCU din Mihăileni

FOSTA PRIMĂRIE din Mihăileni

FABRICA DE CERMAICĂ din Mihăileni

The last and probably the most loved day of the Heritage Caravan was the day dedicated to sports and culinary competitions, exhibition of works and film evenings.

We made the tour of the 20 landmarks on the Mihăileni Map – also available online https://me-qr.com/4037478 – with the whole group of children, mounting the signposts they themselves had made.

The award ceremony was attended by parents. They too came prepared for the cooking competition. Tensions were high, as they are every year, when the votes were counted.

The film evening started with the 4 creations of the children and trainers and continued, in the spirit of the caravan, with a screening of the animated film accompanied by pizza and lots of good cheer.

The feedback notes collected urgently send us back to the community to continue our work in the future, with the children unanimously confirming that they love the proposed activities and want more. And having said that, all the fatigue gathered in preparing and organizing the camp pales when compared to the joy and fulfilment of doing things of real use to the community, in the spirit of discovery and creative transformation of tangible and intangible heritage.

None of this could have been done without the phenomenal help of the trainers and volunteers involved on time and throughout all of this year’s truly demanding activities. So special thanks:

– Ana Maria Apostoiu – for her dedication, for being with us for years and for being the fastest trainer-raiser we know

– Răzvan Bogză – for his creativity, inventiveness and integration into the team as if we had known each other all our lives

– Ruben Mardaru – for his openness, competitive spirit in all activities, hard work to make things go according to plan and continuous involvement in the management of the Enescu House

– Cosmina Manolache – for her perfect integration in the team and in the spirit of Pro Patrimonio activities, professionalism and open-mindedness

– Delia, Teona and Carmen for their punctual involvement

In order to signpost the route for discovering the town of Mihăileni, we had the agreement of the Municipality of Mihăileni. This route has been mapped and narrated since last year in the George Enescu House Notebook, available online  bit.ly/3PIAoW5 and bit.ly/31OQSYA

We thank UiPath Foundation for the partnership and trust it has shown for three years in supporting educational programs and caring for the heritage object, the George Enescu House in Mihăileni.


Read also:

Worksite diary – Landscape and Art Workshop

Landscape and Sound Workshop Log

„The story of my city” – Heritage Caravan at George Enescu House 2022

„The story of my city” – Heritage Caravan at George Enescu House 2022

From 2 to 6 August 2022, the George Enescu House in Mihăileni, Botoșani County, will host for the third consecutive year the Heritage Caravan of the Pro Patrimonio Foundation. The theme for the five days of educational workshops is “The story of my city”.

Around 20 children from the community benefit from an intensive series of practical and creative workshops. These will be coordinated around the theme of discovering their own town and its rich cultural and natural context. The town of Mihăileni, an old border town on the Siret, will be narrated to the children through games and clues, bookbinding, linocuts, interactive panels and on-site signage, theatre workshop, shadow theatre, sketches and video montage. Learning through play is complemented, as tradition has it, by sports and cooking competitions with prizes, an exhibition and film evening that are open, limited places available, to anyone who is curious.

In order to signpost the discovery route of Mihaileni, we appreciate the agreement of Mihaileni Town Hall. This route has been mapped and described since last year in the George Enescu House Notebook, available online https://www.propatrimonio.org/caietul-casei-enescu-ghid-interactiv-de-explorare/

We thank UiPath Foundation for the partnership and trust it has shown for the last three years in supporting educational projects and the care for the heritage building, the George Enescu House in Mihăileni.


Read also:

Worksite diary – Landscape and Art Workshop

Landscape and Sound Workshop Log

Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary – Recipes, Tastes, Objects and Experiments. Press Release.

Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary – Recipes, Tastes, Objects and Experiments. Press Release.

Bucharest, June 16, 2022

Pro Patrimonio Foundation is conducting a cultural, creative, interdisciplinary project in Câmpulung Muscel throughout 2022, bringing together translators and linguists, chefs and gastronomic experts, students and craftsmen, in a unique concept dedicated to the tangible and intangible heritage of the Golescu Villa. The project follows four levels: documentation, gastronomy, heritage education and craftsmanship.

The project started from the discoveries made during the pandemic in the Golescu family’s vast library, namely two recipe notebooks from around 1900 written by Maria Cantili Golescu, Vasile Golescu’s wife. At the beginning of this year, the project team started to document and creatively exploit these materials as part of the intangible heritage belonging to the house and the town of Câmpulung Muscel.

 “All the hidden details of this recipe book open up a surprising universe of that period’s bourgeois class and we hope to capture it as best we can in the materials we will reveal and develop throughout the project.” – architect Andreea Machidon, coordinator of the Education for Heritage project, Pro Patrimonio Foundation

Therefore, each page of one of the two notebooks was carefully photocopied and digitised, followed by the transcription of the original recipes, their translation into Romanian and text editing so that the language becomes easy to understand for the contemporary reader. A translation of a cookbook from 1900, written in four languages and carried by the author from Paris to Bacău and Câmpulung at the beginning of the last century, thus becomes more than a simple translation. It becomes an immersion in the culinary context of an era on the borderline between old and modern and an active collaboration between translators, linguists and historians.

The gathered details reveal an unexpectedly cosmopolitan way of cooking and dining, deeply influenced by Western European culinary trends, especially French, but also English, Iberian, German and Italian. Maria Cantili Golescu belonged to a privileged social class at the time, highly educated, multilingual, widely travelled and who had had the opportunity to live in several European cities. The multiculturalism of the Golescu family, and perhaps of an entire local elite, comes through in these glimpses of everyday life suggested by the way they ate and reveals an interesting piece of Romanian gastronomic history from a decade not yet covered by other sources.

The first developed resource material is the scanned digitised notebook, “Recettes de Cuisine”, which can be found in the Foundation’s useful resource library, and will be presented along with the fully translated and reinterpreted notebook.

 

Maria Cantili Golescu notebook extract

Creative Workshop for Children in Câmpulung

At the beginning of the summer holidays, between 17-20 June, 15 children from the communities of Câmpulung Muscel will take part in three days of activities in the Golescu Villa’s courtyard. The agenda prepared will include on the first day “Plant Day in the edible garden”, then “Notebook, drawing and calligraphy day” and at the end they will go through “Art installation day” with stops in the universe of: culinary objects from the villa, portraits of Maria Cantili, “bizarre” words from manuscripts, family tree and advice from Maria Cantili Golescu.

Thus, children will build, research, interpret, create and play, being mentored by a series of expert guests who will complete the educational journey with valuable information and unique working techniques. The final evening will offer an open-air film in the Golescu Villa garden in the tradition of the Pro Patrimonio Foundation’s Heritage Education Caravan.

The children’s works and explorations will be the subject not only of an online exhibition, but especially of a physical exhibition during the “Festive Community Day” planned for the autumn, when the results of the whole project ” Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary – recipes, tastes, objects and experiments” — the culinary journal, the dedicated objects and the presentation film — will be launched and opened to the interested public.

10 Professional and Amateur Chefs

Also part of the project, the recipes in the notebook were subjected to a selection process with the help of guest culinary experts. Each of them chose two recipes to explore and adapt, and then present them as creatively as possible to their online audience. The selection of recipes will take into account both each individual expert’s preferences and the final content of the Recipe Book, which aims to document and bring to the public’s attention a collection of recipes that is as diverse and rich as possible in terms of both taste and the story that accompanies each tasteful memory. Participants will “translate” and transform the language of the notebook notes into recipes with marked ingredients and clear steps to follow for today’s user. The materials will ultimately form Maria Cantili Golescu’s Recipe Notebook, accessible in both physical and digital formats.

Here are those we invited to bring these old recipes back to life: Andrei Chelaru (Fragment, Cluj), Oana Coantă (Bistro de l’Arte, Brasov), Irina Georgescu (author of the cookbook “Carpathia”), Cristina Mehedințeanu (Horeca Culinary School, Bucharest), Mara Oană (Viscri 32), Mona Petre (Ierburi Uitate), Alex Petricean (Noua, Bucharest), Mădălina Roman (Szikra, Sf. Gheorghe), Horia Simon (Clubul Gastronomic Transilvan), the team of Adriana Sohodoleanu and Cosmin Dragomir (Gastroart) and Adela Trofin (Slow Food Edinburgh).

Over the summer these story fragments and images will gradually be presented on the Pro Patrimonio Foundation website.

 

“Meringues with violets”, cake prepared by Mădălina Roman (Szikra, Sf. Gheorghe) following the original recipe from Maria Cantili Golescu’s notebook

Honest Goods Collection Enriched

The same culinary resources and elements of Maria Cantili Golescu’s life will also form the basis of a new Honest Goods collection dedicated to these discoveries. Children and adults alike will experience recipes and related stories throughout the project through games, competitions, challenges and hands-on projects.

The objects will be made in the spirit of the existing Honest Goods collection, using local materials and craftsmen, with designs prepared by two designers. The resulting objects will be featured on the dedicated Honest Goods object page, each of which will contain in its presentation the recipe that influenced its making.

Honest Goods collection, clay objects

*

“Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary-recipes, tastes, objects and experiments” is a cultural project of Pro Patrimonio Foundation co-financed by AFCN.

Media partners: Scena 9, Rock FM, Muscel TV, Zeppelin Magazine; Friend project: Ierburi Uitate

The digitized booklet, “Recettes de Cuisine”, can be found in the Foundation’s library of useful resources here 


Read more

Standerul de haine cu garderoba Mariei Cantili Golescu şi alte poveşti

„Recettes de Cuisine”, caietul digitalizat 

Girdle, ustensilă istorică de gătit 

Zece Experimente Contemporane din Jurnalul Culinar Maria Cantili Golescu 

Ansamblul Golescu. Observator de Peisaj Cultural în Câmpulung Muscel 

Ansamblul Golescu. Trasee botanice în Parcul Golescu 

Honest Goods. Colecţia Golescu

The Clothes Stand with Maria Cantili Golescu’s Wardrobe and Other Stories

The Clothes Stand with Maria Cantili Golescu’s Wardrobe and Other Stories

The heritage education component of the interdisciplinary project “Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary – recipes, tastes, objects and experiments” took place at Golescu  Villa in Câmpulung Muscel during the long weekend at the beginning of the summer holidays.

The group of children was extremely active and was able to accomplish the whole three-day program of intense activities coordinated by Andreea Machidon and supported by guest trainers Răzvan Bogza, Cosmin Simion, Irina Melente and Ana Maria Apostoiu.

“Plant Day in the Edible Garden”

Friday in the children’s workshop at the Golescu Villa in Câmpulung was Plant Day in the edible garden. The children came in the morning, participated in workshops, lunch and games, training for the Sunday sports competitions and small continuations of the workshops in the first part of the day for those who wanted.

 

“Notebook, Drawing and Calligraphy Day”

The second day of the children’s workshop was taken up with making botanical prints on t-shirts. Inspired by “Recettes de Cuisine” — Maria Cantili Golescu’s 1900’s notebook of recipes and advice — the children started building their own notebook by replicating the cardboard covers with textile and making their personal “coat of arms” with the initials of their name using the linocut technique.

 

In the afternoon we had Delia Zahareanu, a graphic designer specialized in abstract art, calligraphy and graphic design, as our guest. Delia gave us a short and applied introduction to the art of calligraphy, with practical exercises right on the newly made notebooks using tools from the props of professionals in this field.

“Art Installation Day”

The last day of the children’s workshop at Golescu Villa in Câmpulung was reserved for the construction of four thematic installations directly related to Maria Cantili Golescu’s Notebook – “Recettes de Cuisine” and to the times she lived in. All those who will visit us at the official launch event of the rewritten Cantili’s Notebook and the Festive Day at the end of September will be able to browse:

  • The Tree of Plates, with stories related to the culinary objects of Villa Golescu
  • The clothes rack with Maria Cantili’s wardrobe from that period
  • The story box with useful tips from Maria Cantili’s original notebook “Recettes de Cuisine”.
  • The Golescu family tree.

The evening closed with an outdoor film, in the tradition of the Foundation’s Heritage Education Caravan.

The workshop and exploration phase with the children from Câmpulung is over for now but we are moving forward and will constantly present the research project of the translated notebook resources, the collaboration with the ten culinary experts as well as the collaboration with craftsmen from the Muscelu area for the continuation of the Honest Goods collection.

 

For those curious to feel the atmosphere of this year’s workshops, the editorial team of MuscelTV Câmpulung has made a conclusive report.

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“Maria Cantili Golescu’s Culinary Diary-recipes, tastes, objects and experiments” is a cultural project of Pro Patrimonio Foundation co-financed by AFCN.

Media partners: Scena 9, Rock FM, Muscel TV, Zeppelin Magazine; Friend project: Ierburi Uitate

 

The digitized booklet, “Recettes de Cuisine”, can be found in the Foundation’s library of useful resources here 


Read more:

Comunicat de presă. Jurnal culinar Maria Cantili Golescu – rețete, gusturi, obiecte și experimente

Zece Experimente Contemporane din Jurnalul Culinar Maria Cantili Golescu 

Girdle, ustensilă istorică de gătit 

„Recettes de Cuisine”, caietul digitalizat 

Ansamblul Golescu. Observator de Peisaj Cultural în Câmpulung Muscel 

Ansamblul Golescu. Trasee botanice în Parcul Golescu 

Honest Goods. Colecţia Golescu

 

2022 Olari Construction Site Log

2022 Olari Construction Site Log

April – November, construction site and agriculture

The constant, step-by-step restoration of the Neamțu Manor in Olari has been started since 2018. Currently undergoing restoration, the manor is an important landmark for the local community. Started in 2021 together with the UiPath Foundation the project “Experimental Centre for Studies and Education at the Neamțu Manor in Olari” is dedicated to this place. As in all other interventions carried out by Pro Patrimonio, the restoration, the construction site and all efforts to activate, educate and involve the local community are open, public processes.

After completig the facades’ restoration in 2022, this year we are focusing our efforts to carry out repairs and restoration of the finishes in the interior spaces of the manor floor.

Thus, we have started working on the ceilings, where the manor largely kept only the roof structure beams. There are a few exceptions: in the room facing the main façade, a large part of the vaulted ceiling has been preserved, and in the loggia on the north-west side, fragments of the wooden panelling covering the ceiling have been preserved.

The threadlike wooden battens substructure of the ceiling plaster has now been rebuilt and the first layer of mineral wool is being laid in the attic. We are using modern materials (basaltic mineral wool, generously sponsored by  Rockwool România, thank you!) in order not to add extra weight to the existing structure and to increase the interior comfort of the floor, limiting heat loss during cold periods, when we will heat and use the spaces.

At the same time, we are also adding the electrical installation for lighting, sockets and switches, in compliance with all the technical safety regulations.

We have also started to install the canopy at the secondary entrance. This was dismantled last year to complete repairs to the facade plaster. The team of carpenters led by Mr. Florin Ganea — who has helped us for years with specialized work on the Wooden Church from Urși — cleaned the wooden pieces and filled in what was missing, in order to rebuild the entire canopy.

At the „Experimental Centre for Studies and Education at the Neamțu Manor in Olari” we have been testing over the past year soil stability solutions for dry, parched land types. This agricultural experiment for the garden at the Neamțu Manor in Olari showed that it is necessary to work on smaller segments to create areas of favourable microclimate. These can then be slowly extended over the whole field.

For this purpose, for the northern windbreak, we continued planting branches of wicker (Salix Viminalis), a plant that exists in the vineyard areas where it is used to tie the vine ropes. The rest of the land is still used for small production crops ( sunflower and corn – local varieties).

The manor’s caretakers weed the crops by hand. We would like to be able to purchase a professional tiller to make the work and the labour more efficient. The caretakers are employed from the local community and also work to help the teams of craftsmen restoring the manor.

June

The room we call the “chapel” is beginning to take shape thanks to the architectural details. The restoration craftsmen together with the caretakers of the manor have repaired the ceiling, installed the electrical fittings and just finished the plastering, so the space suddenly looks much more airy.

July

September

At the beginning of autumn, the sunflowers and the corn grown on the land around the manor were harvested. We sell this grain for firewood and other expenses for future plantations. With the help of a private donor, we were able to buy a chainsaw, which will be of great help in the following agricultural work.

We thank him with gratitude. Small steps that create a whole.

Between August 30 and September 3, 2022, the Neamţu Manor in Olari became the host of the Pro Patrimonio Foundation’s Heritage Caravan for the 7th consecutive year. “The story of my village” was the theme of educational workshops.

Approximately 20 children from the local community benefited from an intense program of practical and creative workshops coordinated by the theme of discovering their own village and the cultural and natural context it has.

We thanks for the support to UiPath Foundation.

October

We took advantage of a still warm autumn at Neamţu Manor. We are installing the insulation donated by ROCKWOOL under the floor above the basement so that we can heat the upstairs room in the future. Soon we will be able to host the children’s workshops in the mansion as well, not just outside, on summer days.

 

Foto: Daniela Gheorghiu

Foto: Raluca Munteanu

November

At the end of a new year of extensive construction, the Neamţu Manor presents itself brightly in the meadow of Olteţ river. It is an example of strong hope for other historical monuments that can be saved and given a new life.

We thank our individual donors who choose to support this lasting project as well as the companies that constantly support us.

Foto: Ovidiu Serghe

 

Citeşte şi: 

Kituri pentru copii “Patrimoniul la Pachet, stilul Art Nouveau” la Casa George Enescu din Mihăileni și Conacul Neamţu din Olari

Jurnal de şantier 2021

Tablou activitati 2022 Olari Construction Site Log

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