Cantacuzino-Pașcanu (Mavrocordat) Manor, Popești

Summary

A neoclassical 36-room manor in Popești, Iași County, built in the 1880s by Alexandru Mavrocordat after his marriage to Lucia Cantacuzino-Pașcanu. Used in the communist era as a sanatorium and a children's hospital annex, it was restituted in 1998 and restoration started in 1999.

Legal status

Taken into state ownership under Decree 83/1949; restituted by the Iași court in November 1998 to a Sturdza family heir; listed LMI IS-II-a-B-04229 ↗

History

The village is first documented in 1426, and the Mavrocordat family held the estate for a long time; they built the manor church around 1776. After marrying Lucia Cantacuzino-Pașcanu in 1883, Prince Alexandru Mavrocordat demolished the old house and built a 36-room neoclassical palace with Italian craftsmen. Lucia ran the estate after his death in 1907, and by her will it passed in 1930 to her daughter Olga, who married Prince Mihail Sturdza. The 1945 land reform cut the estate to 50 ha and in 1949 the house was taken into state ownership. It later served as a tuberculosis sanatorium and an annex of a children's hospital, and deteriorated. The social centre left in 1995. In 1998 a Sturdza heir won restitution of the manor and 50 ha in court, and consolidation and restoration works began in 1999 under architect Nicolae Munteanu.

Transactions & prices

Listed components

• Conacul Cantacuzino - Pașcanu — sec. XVIII (IS-II-m-B-04229.01)
• Biserica „Sf. Voievozi” — 1776 (IS-II-m-B-04229.02)

Sources & links