Bulgur Palas
Historical mansion in Turkey
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Bulgur Palas, originally known as the Bolulu Habip Bey Mansion, is a historical mansion located in Istanbul, Turkey. It was restored and redeveloped into a library and cultural center for public use after its acquisition by the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality in 2021.
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| Bulgur Palas | |
|---|---|
Bulgur Palas in the 1990s as office building of Ottoman Bank | |
 Interactive map of the Bulgur Palas area | |
General information | |
Architectural style | First national architectural movement |
| Location | Aksaray, Kargı Çk. 5, 34096 Fatih, Istanbul |
| Coordinates | 41°00′25″N 28°56′38″E |
Construction started | 1912 |
| Renovated | 2021 |
| Owner | Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (İBB) |
| Technical details | |
| Floor count | 5 |
| Floor area | 3,750 m2 (40,400 sq ft) |
| Design and construction | |
| Architect | Alessandro Valeri[1] |
Location
The Bulgur Palas is located on Kocamustafapaşa Hill, one of the seven hills of Istanbul,[2] at Kargı Çıkmazı 5, in Aksaray in Fatih, a municipality of Istanbul in Turkey.
History
The mansion was commissioned by Mehmet Habip Bey (1878–1926), a soldier and a deputy of Bolu from the Committee of Union and Progress in the Ottoman Parliament of the Second Constitutional era (1908–1920),[2][3] and it was thought to be designed in 1912 by Giulio Mongeri (1873–1951), a Levantine architect of Italian descent,[4][5][6] however, a recent discovery has revealed that the building was in fact designed by Alessandro Valeri at a later date.[1] The construction of the house, also called the Bolulu Habip Bey Mansion, was financed by the trade in grain and bulgur, a cracked wheat foodstuff, during World War I.[2]
Habip Bey was arrested after the Armistice of Mudros in 1918, and exiled to Malta in 1919, leaving construction unfinished.[2][3][5] As a result of financial difficulties he encountered during that period, the house was mortgaged to the Ottoman Bank as security for a loan.[2] After his sudden death in 1926 from a heart attack, the building was transferred to the Ottoman Bank as collateral for the family's debts. For a period of time, the mansion was used as a bank archive, and its three apartments as residences for bank employees and their families. A downstairs room was reserved as a birdhouse for hundreds of domestic canaries, which were probably raised to live in the branches of the Ottoman Bank.[3][7] The building was later abandoned.[5]
In 1955, the mansion became the target of looting during the Istanbul pogrom because of the non-Muslim families living there at that time and the non-Turkish character of the Ottoman Bank.[3] The building remained under the ownership of the Ottoman Bank and passed in 2001 into the ownership of Garanti Bank, which had acquired the Ottoman Bank.[2] In 2021, the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality purchased the Bulgur Palas,[7] and began efforts to restore the building, intending to open it to the public as a document center, archive, library, exhibition hall, and café. The building was opened to visitors on 28 February 2024.[8]
Architecture
Mongeri's design exhibits traces of the First national architectural movement.[6] The building consists of three full floors and one half floor.[9] According to the current owner, the building has five floors.[10] There is also an observation terrace.[10] The main body of the building is constructed with unplastered red brick, and only the part with the towers is plastered. There is a railing-free deck around the domed roof at the top. The mansion is surrounded by extremely high walls.[3]
Bulgur Palas features 3,750 m2 (40,400 sq ft) of covered space in 81 independent sections, a 1,750 m2 (18,800 sq ft) open area, a 1,000 m2 (11,000 sq ft) outbuilding, and a 9 m2 (97 sq ft) ornamental pool.[2] The newly established library section with 150-seat capacity contains about 25,000 books and documents.[10]
Bulgur Palas (June 2015)
During Restoration (September 2023)
