Istanbul Attractions

Venue: Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts    When: Daily; not Mon

The Museum of Turkish and Islamic Arts is housed in one of Istanbul's most beautiful buildings, the Ibrahim Pasha Palace.

Ibrahim Pasha was Grand Vizir to Süleyman the Magnificent. He built the elegant Ottoman palace between 1520 and 1536, when he occupied the most important position in the Ottoman Empire. Ibrahim was ultimately garotted and killed, but he left behind him the Empire's grandest private residence.

Today, the palace houses a superb collection of ceramics, metalwork miniatures, calligraphy, textiles, woodwork and most importantly, some of the oldest and most beautiful Turkish carpets in the world.

The largest room in the palace is painted red and beautifully roofed with black beams. It sports a selection of these enormous carpets. Characterised by elaborate floral motifs and a number of Far Eastern motifs including lotus blossoms, tiger-stripes and Chinese clouds, these carpets were especially commissioned by wealthy patrons for homes or mosques and were woven in workshops in the town of Usak by professional weavers.

After the carpets, it's worth having a look at the ethnographic rooms of the palace, where traditional yurts inhabited by the nomads of the Caucasian steppe have been lovingly reconstructed. See how natural dyes are gathered and used (camomile for yellow, madder for red etc), when and how the wool is spun and explore the lifestyle of nomads. You then walk through a timeline of the lives of Turkish women over the centuries, which is nothing if not bizarre!

From the central courtyard of the museum, there is a fabulous view over the Hippodrome to the Blue Mosque. A quiet space with tables and chairs arranged in the shade make this museum one of the most pleasant and relaxed places to spend an afternoon in Istanbul. It should not be missed.