Vrana Palace

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Vrana Palace (дворец Врана, dvorets Vrana) is a royal palace, located in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria. It is the official residence of the deposed Tsar Simeon II of Bulgaria and his wife Tsaritsa Margarita.

The land was bought by Tsar Ferdinand I in 1898 and is situated just outside Sofia. There is a park and two buildings, the first one built in 1904 as a hunting lodge and the second in 1912 as a palace.

In 1918 Vrana passed from Tsar Ferdinand to Boris III. In 1943, it became property of Simeon II. The legality of these transactions is disputed by Bulgarian politicians. After the abolition of the monarchy, Vrana was taken by the communists and became a residence of Georgi Dimitrov in 1946.

After the fall of the communist regime, Vrana was returned to the last tsar, Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, by the Bulgarian Constitutional Court in June 1998, but Simeon donated the park to the city of Sofia in October 1999, opening it this way to the public. He moved in with his wife Margarita into the renovated palace in 2001.

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