A SPLENDID OTTOMAN MANSION IN ZIVERBEY

You take a step back in time when you enter the Razi Trak Mansion, a jewel of late-Ottoman architecture on the Asian side of the Bosphorus. Built for a wealthy merchant, the 200-year-old mansion passed to a keeper of the sultan’s wardrobe, then to a homesick Egyptian Princess. For more than a century it has been home to the Trak family, including the late Razi Trak, twice chairman of Fenerbahçe football club. Behind an elegant carved timber façade lie 26 hauntingly beautiful rooms, each worthy of a museum, set over four floors. Exquisite hand-painted murals depict Istanbul landscapes and landmarks, along with pyramids and glimpses of the Nile. Rich in fin-de-siècle detail, the whole edifice is redolent of the history of Empire and Republic. Kâzım Karabekir Pasha and Cafer Tayyar Pasha, Atatürk’s comrades-in-arms, were among many notable figures to have graced its lofty salons, some with ceilings soaring to a height of five metres. An oasis in bustling Kadiköy, surrounded by greenery, this storybook of a house is just waiting to begin a new chapter.