The Floreasca Racecourse, the green corner of old Bucharest, which has transformed over time into a luxury district

The history of this area begins more than four centuries ago, the first attestation dating back to the time when Mihai Viteazul was the ruler of Wallachia.

The name Floreasca comes from the noble family of the Florești, who were lords over almost all of this area and who had built a magnificent estate on the shores of Lake Colentina. As a memory of those times, the church of Saint Sofia, located on Calea Floreasca 216, survived the earthquake of 1736, and was later fully restored by the Florești family.

Jump in time, to the period after the First World War, when on the shores of Lake Floreasca the work of the man who also stands behind the Mărășești Mausoleum appears – George Negropontes. He gathered around him some of the biggest horse racing enthusiasts in Bucharest and founded the National Society for the Improvement of the Horse Breed, the organization that coordinated the Floreasca Hippodrome project.

Read, on B365.ro, about Negropontes’ racecourse, which had such a short history.