The Bells Monument

The Bells monument is situated 14 km eastwards from the center of Sofia at the foot of Vitosha Mountain. Children from all over the planet built into the unique monument their faith in the good and bright days without war and violence to come.

The United Nations Organization declared 1979 as the Year of the Child and their Problems. The little being, no matter in which part of the planet he/she is and color his/her skin craves both to live in peace and a good environment and to study and develop.

On that occasion, the idea of the organization of an international meeting for children from all over the world sprang up as a natural impulse. Later this meeting turned into an international movement. Together with the establishment of the “Banner of Peace” movement with its motto – “Unity, Creativity, Beauty”, as a tradition with enormous international authority, the idea of building a monument came into existence. The monument symbolizes the striving of children from all over the world to live and grow according to the laws of beauty.

Lyudmila Zhivkova suggested the creation of the Monument and the idea was carried out by a group of specialists: leader – sculptor Kroum Damaynov, members – architects Blagoi Atanasov and Georgi Genchevq sculptor Mihael Benchev and engineer Anton Maleev. The monument was built in just 30 days.

The main architectural accent of this unique monument is four vertical pylons 37 m high orientated towards the four cardinal points and a spiral composition of two semi-rings on different levels with the bells. A spatial sphere is formed at the upper end of the four pylons, representing the world. In it spirally is situated seven bells, a symbol of the seven world continents. These bells, cast in 1982 in the bronze foundry of the Synodical complex in Sofia by Ivan Kostadinov, have with overall weight of 12 tons, with the biggest weight of 3650kg. Except as a symbol they are designed for accompanying instruments at concert performances on the main musical bells which are 18 in number, mounted at the foot of the pylons. They were cast in 1979 and were selected and turned in by Prof. Dobri Paliev.

Concrete module rings having 60m diameter are laid out as a second spiral around the base body. More than 95 bells from different countries and social organizations are mounted in the semi-spheres of these rings.