Istanbul Guide

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AYA TRIADA CHURCH Map p244 (Hagia Triada; Meşelik Sokak, Taksim; h 8.30am-6pm; m Taksim) Built in 1880, this is İstanbul’s largest Greek Orthodox church and has a small but loyal congregation. At tacked during the appalling anti-minority events of 6–7 September 1955, it was ex tensively damaged and pillaged but man aged to survive an arson attempt. Finally restored in the first years of the new millen nium, it was re-inaugurated in 2003. İSTANBUL ARASTIRMALARI ENSTITÜSÜ CULTURAL CENTRE Map p244 (İstanbul Research Institute; % 0212 334 0900; http://en.iae.org.tr; Meşrutiyet Caddesi 47, Tepebaşı; h 10am-7pm Mon-Sat; m Şişhane, j Tünel) F Associated with the nearby Pera Museum, this institution incorpo rates a publicly accessible research library focusing on the cultural and social history of İstanbul during the Byzantine, Ottoman and Republican periods. It also stages tem porary exhibitions, conferences and semi nars dealing with this subject. GALERI NEV GALLERY Map p244 ( % 0212-252 1525; www.galerinev istanbul.com; 4th fl, Mısır Apt, İstiklal Caddesi 163; h 11am-6.30pm Tue-Sat, closed Sat Jul & Aug; m Şişhane, j Tünel) One of the city’s oldest and most impressive commercial galleries, Nev numbers many of the country’s best-known modernists among its stable of artists. GALERIST GALLERY Map p248 ( % 0212-252 1896; www.galerist.com. tr; 1st fl, Meşrutiyet Caddesi 67, Tepebaşı; h 11am 7pm Tue-Sat; m Şişhane, j Tünel) Located in one of the city’s most fashionable enclaves, this highly regarded commercial gallery shows Turkish and international artists working in a variety of media. It has a sec ond space in the rapidly gentrifying Golden Horn suburb of Hasköy. MIXER GALLERY Map p244 ( % 0212-243 5443; www.mixerarts. com; basement, Sıraselvıler Caddesi 35, Taksim; h 11am-7pm Tue-Sat; m Taksim) Its avowed purpose is to discover emerging artists and make unique artworks accessible to all, and since opening in Tophane in 2012 Mixer has done a good job in both areas. This new space in Taksim opened in late 2015 and has hosted a number of exciting group shows. Its ‘Mixer Editions’ program offers original artworks at affordable prices.

as the Çiçek Pasajı and is full of meyhanes (taverns) serving mediocre food. As Pera declined in the mid-20th century, so too did this building. Its once-stylish shops gave way to rough meyhanes where beer barrels were rolled out onto the pave ment, wooden stools were arranged and enthusiastic revellers caroused the night away. It continued in this vein until the late 1970s, when parts of the building collapsed. When it was reconstructed, the arcade ac quired a glass canopy to protect pedestrians from bad weather, its makeshift barrels and stools were replaced with solid wooden ta bles and benches, and its broken pavement was covered with smooth tiles. These days its raffish charm is nearly gone and most lo cals bypass the touts and the mediocre food on offer and instead make their way behind the passage to the bars and meyhanes on or around Nevizade Sokak. PERA PALACE HOTEL HISTORIC BUILDING Map p248 (Pera Palas Oteli; % 0212-377 4000; www.perapalace.com; Meşrutiyet Caddesi 52, Tepebaşı; m Şişhane, j Tünel) The Pera Palace was a project of Georges Nagelmackers, the Belgian entrepreneur who linked Paris and Constantinople with his famous Orient Ex press train service. The 1892 building has undergone a €23-million restoration in re cent years and claims to have regained its position as İstanbul’s most glamorous hotel (p184). Its bar, tea lounge, patisserie and restaurant are open to the public. Nagelmackers founded the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits et Grands Express Européens in 1868. The Orient Ex press service first operated in 1883 and the entrepreneur soon realised that İstanbul had no suitably luxurious hotels where his esteemed passengers could stay. His solu tion was to build one himself and he com missioned the fashionable İstanbul-born but French-trained architect Alexandre Vallaury to design it. On opening, the hotel advertised itself as having ‘a thoroughly healthy situation, being high up and isolated on all four sides’, and ‘overlooking the Golden Horn and the whole panorama of Stamboul’. Its guests included Agatha Christie, who supposedly wrote Mur der on the Orient Express in room 411; Mata Hari, who no doubt frequented the elegant bar with its lovely stained-glass windows and excellent eavesdropping opportunities; and Greta Garbo, who probably enjoyed her own company in one of the spacious suites.

Beyoğlu Sights