Where I Wander: Bulgaria

From Sofia to Plovdiv to Veliko Tarnovo, Bulgaria unfolded before me like a richly layered tapestry, each city revealing its own rhythm of history, craft, and materiality. As a designer, I couldn’t help but notice how every detail — from stone carvings to timber balconies — spoke not just of architectural heritage but of the way places shape, and are shaped by, the people who live in them.

Sofia felt like a city of thresholds. Walking its streets, I moved constantly between past and present — Roman ruins displayed beneath glass walkways, Orthodox churches sharing space with wide twentieth-century boulevards. One evening, we wandered to Sofia’s main pedestrian street and paused before the Patriarchal Cathedral of Saint Alexander Nevsky. Floodlit against the night, its golden domes shimmered, and the stained glass glowed softly from within. The carved stone friezes caught the light in dramatic shadows, making the building feel both monumental and intimate, ancient and alive.

In Plovdiv, one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in Europe, the rhythm shifted. The Old Town felt like a crossroads of civilizations, carrying traces of Roman amphitheaters, Ottoman mosques, and Bulgarian Revival houses. Along the cobblestones, I lingered at timbered homes with overhanging balconies, their wood darkened by centuries of weather and touch. Many were adorned with hand-cut ornament — delicate patterns that caught the sunlight and cast lace-like shadows. These details felt almost like breaths of the past, reminders that craft is more than decoration; it is memory, materialized.

Veliko Tarnovo, the medieval capital of the Second Bulgarian Empire, rises dramatically along steep hillsides. The city seems to cling to its past while gazing toward the future. I found myself pausing before a weathered oak door, palm resting on its cool iron handle, worn smooth where countless hands once pressed. Even the smallest details here — a hinge, a latch, a carved motif — felt charged with centuries of ritual and meaning. Above the city, the fortress of Tsarevets crowns the ridge with winding pathways and unexpected corners. At the summit, a church with almost cubist-like murals covered the walls, its handmade tile floors anchoring the space in earthy tradition.

Traveling through Bulgaria revealed more than monuments or museums. It revealed a way of seeing — an attentiveness to how materials, landscapes, and histories intertwine. Every surface, from stone to glass to wood to iron, told a story of endurance and adaptation. For me, the lesson was clear: design at its best is never only about form or function. It is about memory, atmosphere, and belonging. It is about carrying forward the quiet stories embedded in details — the ones you only discover when you pause long enough to notice.