Georgi Stoilov

Below you will find a short biography of the Bulgarian architect Georgi Stoilov.
To read our 2015 interview with Stoilov, click here.

A SHORT BIOGRAPHY OF ARCHITECT Georgi Stoilov

Georgi Vladimirov Stoilov was born on 3rd April 1929 in Kondofrey, Bulgaria – a village in Pernik province, located roughly 60km from Sofia.

During WWII, Stoilov was one of Bulgaria’s youngest anti-fascist partisans, serving with the Radomir Partisan Detachment at the age of 15. He joined the Labor Youth Union in 1944, becoming a full member of the Bulgarian Communist Party by 1949. 

In 1954, Stoilov went to study at the Moscow Architectural Institute and took a job the same year with the engineering firm Glavproekt. Later, in 1965, he would spend a year in Paris developing a specialism in urban planning.

Georgi Stoilov, centre, pictured with partisan officers in 1944.

Rila Hotel, Sofia (Georgi Stoilov, 1961)

One of Stoilov’s early projects was the design for Rila Hotel in Sofia (1961), which was followed by various other state and leisure buildings throughout Bulgaria including the Bulgarian National Radio building, the International Youth Camp at Druzhba and the National Centre for Air Control at Sofia Airport. In addition to his work in Bulgaria, other projects by Georgi Stoilov include a residential complex in Dubna, Russia; Bulgarian embassy buildings for Kabul, Afghanistan and Havana, Cuba; and a commercial project for Astana, Kazakhstan.

The architect is also responsible for designing some of the most striking memorial complexes in Bulgaria. He created the Monument to the Dead in the Fatherland War at Dobrich (1964), the Arch of Liberty in the Beklemeto Pass (1980) and the Pantheon to the Heroes in the Serbo-Bulgarian War, at Gurgulyat (1985). The Buzludzha Memorial House remains his most famous design, however.

Monument to the Dead in the Fatherland War, Dobrich (Georgi Stoilov, 1964)

Arch of Liberty, Beklemeto Pass (Georgi Stoilov, 1980)

Pantheon to the Heroes in the Serbo-Bulgarian War, Gurgulyat (Georgi Stoilov, 1985)

Georgi Stoilov served as mayor of Sofia from 1967 until 1971, following which he was appointed Bulgaria’s Minister of Architecture and Public Works, up until 1973. In 1979 Stoilov was appointed Chairman of the Union of Architects in Bulgaria and from 1985 until 1987 he served as Chairman of the International Union of Architects. In 1987 Stoilov co-founded the International Academy of Architecture, and he remains its president to this day.

Georgi Stoilov at his office in Sofia, May 2018.

Georgi Stoilov: Honours LIST

Honorary Professor of Tbilisi Technical University, Georgia (1984)
Visiting Professor of US New York University (1985)
Honorary Professor of the National Polytechnic Institute in Mexico (1985)
Academician of the French Academy of Architecture (1985)
Honorary Member of the Union of USSR Architects (1986)
Honorary Member of the American Institute of Architects (1986)
Honorary Member of the Federation of Mexico Architects (1986)
Honorary Member of the Union of Spanish Architects (1986)
Honorary Professor of Buenos Aires University, Argentina (1986)
Honorary Member of the Royal Institute of Canadian Architects (1987)
Honorary Member of the Union of Architects of the former Czechoslovakia (1987)
Academician of the International Academy of Architecture (1987)
Honoris Causa Doctor of Moscow Institute of Architecture, Russia (2001)
Academician of the Russian Academy of Architecture and Civil Engineering (2001)
Academician of the Russian Academy of Arts (2001)
Academician of the Ukraine Academy of Architecture (2002)
President of the International Academy of Architecture

A Short Biography of Architect Georgi Stoilov
Author: Richard F. Morten, 2018.

Sources:
Granitski, Ivan (ed.) (2018) Georgi Stoilov: With a Vision for the Future, Zahariy Stoyanov Publishing House.
Stoilov, Georgi (2015) Personal interview with Richard F. Morten, translation by Mihail Kondov, 7 August 2015.
Yuroukov, Ilya (ed.) (1991) Georgi Stoilov & Partners (architectural monograph), Arterigere.