Toma Barbu Socolescu

Toma Gheorghe Barbu Socolescu a Romanian architect, son of Toma T. Socolescu and grandson of Toma N. Socolescu, functionalist in spite of himself, he had to espouse the directives of the Socialist Republic of Romania.
Graduated in architecture from the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts of Paris in 1939. He was admitted to the 2nd class on July 10, 1934, winning two 3rd medals in construction and ornamental design, then to the 1st class on November 4, 1936, winning a 2nd medal for a submitted design.
Before and during his studies, Toma Barbu Socolescu worked on the interior design of the transatlantic liner Normandie in 1932-1935 in Roger-Henri Expert's studio.
His first steps were taken alongside his father Toma T. Socolescu, in the 1940s, with whom he worked on several projects in the Prahova Judet: plans for a locomotive depot in Ploiești as well as the systematization plans for Câmpina and Mizil. His first appointment was as a university assistant at the Ion Mincu Institute of Architecture (Bucharest) in 1939, a post he held until 1951. According to his declaration in his registration file with the Directorate of Higher Education in 1940, he was then on 12 months' military service with the rank of second lieutenant in the Romanian army.
He spent the rest of his career working on industrial architecture and large-scale civil buildings. From 1942 to 1945, he was Design Architect at the C.A.M (Cassa Autonomă a Monopolurilor Regatului României), a position he would still assume from 1949 to 1951 at the IPC (Institute of Design and Construction). From 1952 to 1958, he was chief design architect at the Institute of Design for Industrial Constructions (IPCI), while also working externally for the Ministry of Local Economy, building canteens, housing and administrative pavilions. He pursued his expertise as chief design architect at the Institute of Design for Petroleum Refineries or Institutul de Proiectari pentru Instalatii Petroliere (IPIP SA) from 1958 to 1960. Finally, from 1960 to 1967, he worked as a consultant architect at the Institute of Design for Food Industries (IPIA) or Institutul de Proiectare al Industriei Alimentare. He ended his career as a professor at the Technical School of Architecture and Town Building (Școala Tehnică de Arhitectură și Construcția Orașelor) of Bucharest, from 1967 to 1970.
Barbu Socolescu built a number of industrial projects, including a large-scale canning factory at Ovidiu near Constanța, from 1959 to 1965, a site which would later house the country's first Pepsi-Cola plant.
Also a painter, he exhibited his watercolors at an exhibition organized by the Union of Architects of the Socialist Republic of Romania in Bucharest in 1954.
Toma Barbu's career was more modest than his abilities would have suggested, as his family suffered political persecution. The Romanian political police monitored him for much of his career, as they did his father. He was prosecuted for demonstrations hostile to the State and summoned several times by the Securitate. As he was not considered dangerous to the regime, the prosecution had no follow-up.
He was a member of several groups of architects:
The Socol family of Berivoiul-Mare [ro], formerly part of Făgăraș or Țara Făgărașului is a branch of the Socol family of Muntenia, which lived in the county of Dâmbovița. A 'Socol', great boyar and son-in-law of Mihai Viteazul (1557–1601), had two religious foundations in Dâmbovița county, still existing, Cornești and Răzvadu de Sus. He built their churches and another one in the suburb of Târgoviște. This boyar married Marula, daughter of Tudora din Popești, also known as Tudora din Târgșor, sister of Prince Antonie-Vodă. Marula was recognized by Mihai Viteazul as his illegitimate daughter, following an extra-marital liaison with Tudora. Marula is buried in the church of Răzvadu de Sus, where, on a richly carved stone slab, her name can be read.
Nicolae Iorga, the great Romanian historian and friend of Barbu's father Toma T. Socolescu, found Socol ancestors among the founders of the City of Făgăraș in the 12th century. In 1655, the Prince of Transylvania George II Rákóczi ennobled an ancestor of Nicolae G. Socol: "Ștefan Boier din Berivoiul Mare, and through him his wife Sofia Spătar, his son Socoly, and their heirs and descendants of whatever sex, to be treated and regarded as true and undeniable NOBLEMEN.", in gratitude for his services as the Prince's courier in the Carpathians, a function "which he fulfilled faithfully and steadfastly for many years, and especially in these stormy times [...]". Around 1846, five Socol come to Muntenia, from Berivoiu Mare [ro], in the territory of Făgăraș.
One of the brothers was architect Nicolae Gh. Socol (??-1872). He settled in Ploiești around 1840-1845, and named himself Socolescu. He married Iona Săndulescu, from the Sfantu Spiridon suburb. He had a daughter (died in infancy) and four sons, two of whom became major architects: Toma N. Socolescu and Ion N. Socolescu [ro]. The lineage of architects continues with Toma T. Socolescu, and his son Barbu Socolescu.
The historian, cartographer and geographer Dimitrie Papazoglu [ro] evokes, in 1891, the presence of Romanian boyars of the first rank Socoleşti, in Bucharest, descendants of Socol from Dâmbovița. Finally, Constantin Stan also refers, in 1928, to the precise origin of Nicolae Gheorghe Socol :
Almost all of Barbu Socolescu's projects are in the industrial field, particularly in the food industry.
The entire factory has been emptied of its machine tools, and only the building and its metal structures remain clearly recognizable (in April 2024), despite extensions and modifications. It is located in a square bounded by the strada Tulcea and the strada Intrarea petrolului.