Category: Residential
Type: Museum
Location: Darüşşafaka, Büyükdere Ave. Sarıyer
Date: 1860
Designer: Unknown
Period: Ottoman Empire
Photo: T.C. Cumhurbaşkanlığı Milli Saraylar Başkanlığı (millisaraylar.gov.tr)
Commissioned by Sultan Abdülaziz in the 1860s and named after the district’s water distribution reservoirs, the Maslak Pavilions represent a significant 19th-century Ottoman complex that served as the personal residence and “Imperial Farm” for Sultan Abdülhamid II. Architecturally characterized by the traditional Turkish house plan type, the sprawling 170,000-square-meter estate integrates residential structures like the Imperial Pavilion (Harem) and reception apartments with functional spaces for the Sultan’s diverse interests in carpentry, music, and agriculture. After serving as a military preventorium between 1937 and 1982, the complex was restored in 1984 and now operates as a museum under the Directorate of National Palaces, preserving its unique synthesis of royal domesticity, rare tropical flora in its historic greenhouses, and rural landscape design.
Beylerbeyi Palace was used as a summer residence and as the State Guest House. Many guests stayed here like Franz Joseph, Emperor of Austria-Hungary (1869); Eugénie, Empress of France (1869); Nikola, King of Montenegro (1874) and German Emperor Wilhelm II. Sultan Abdülhamid II, after he was dethroned, spent his last six years in Beylerbeyi Palace and died here in 1918.
