Branko Pešić, who continued the building after the long building ban, described it in 1988: The adoption of the "Haghia Sophia" was led by impulses from western academic circles and literature, above all French and German, which acknowledged the Byzantine tradition in the rationality of construction from which followed spatial clarity, shown in a logical visually apparent image of the constructive system in the building structure. Since the beginning of the development of the scholarly discipline of architectural history in Serbia, St. Sophia has been referred to as a superior realization, equivalently in the importance of its constructive solution, structure and spatial effects. This was reasonably a reverberation of the global presentation of this church, whose modern life, from the beginning of the middle of the 19th century, became surprisingly dynamic and complex. The magnetic attraction of its architectural solution boosted towards the end of the 19th century and reached its highest amplitude in Serbia in the interwar years. Owing to its architectural uniqueness, St. Sophia is often regarded as a structure without examples and imitation, though the Justinianian church remained an "archetype-building" - and not in the context of its place in Byzantine architecture, rather as symbol of Byzantine cultural authenticity and partly superiority - from which it gained in importance in the narratives in the relationship between the Byzantine and Serbian identities and in the parentologic metaphor of the link between Byzantium and the medieval Serbian state. Construction Forty years after the initial idea, construction of the church began on 10 May 1935, 340 years after the burning of Saint Sava's remains. The cornerstone was laid by Metropolitan Gavrilo of Montenegro, (the future Serbian Patriarch Gavrilo V). The project was designed by Aleksandar Deroko and Bogdan Nestorović, aided by civil engineer Vojislav Zađina. The work lasted until Second World War Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941. The church's foundation had been completed, and the walls erected to the height of 7 and 11 meters. After the 1941 bombing of Belgrade, work ceased altogether. The occupying German army used the unfinished church as the Wehrmacht's parking lot, while in 1944 the Red Army, and later the Yugoslav People's Army used it for the same purpose. After that, it was used for storage by various companies. The Society for Building of the Church ceased to exist and has not been revived. Children who grew up in the vicinity, including the