Maslak Pavilions

Sultan Abdülaziz had the Maslak Pavilions built in the 1860s, and in 1868 he gave them to his nephew, Prince Abdülhamid. The name comes from the maslak, the water distribution tanks that supplied the city from this area. The prince bought up the land around the pavilions, bred horses, farmed, and was living here when he was called to the throne in 1876 as Abdülhamid II; as sultan he kept the estate as the Maslak imperial farm.

From 1937 to 1982 the buildings served as a military preventorium. After restoration in 1984 they opened as a house museum under the National Palaces Administration.

The Administration lists more than a dozen structures on the site: the Kasr-ı Hümâyûn, which served as the harem; the Mâbeyn-i Hümâyûn, where guests were received; a viewing kiosk from which mounted exercises were watched; a pool, a bath, an orangery, a telegraph room, the stable and the kitchen among them. They follow the plan of a Turkish house rather than the halls of a palace, and they stand in a garden the Administration puts at about 170,000 square metres, with a greenhouse of tropical plants.

That shape decides how the visit works. The group moves between separate buildings across open ground instead of following one corridor. Say what everyone must hear -- the story of the prince, the plan of the visit, the meeting point and the time -- in the garden, before the first door.

The Maslak Pavilions are run by the National Palaces Administration, and its visiting rules make a headset system mandatory once a group with a licensed guide is larger than eight people (article 8). Guides may not narrate loudly indoors without one (article 7), and staff can remove a visitor who ignores the rules from the site. This is a written rule, not a courtesy.

The rules do not name a type of system. If you plan to use anything other than the familiar rented sets, a phone-based system like ours included, confirm with the palace administration that it is accepted before the day. The article texts, every site the rule covers and the ways to meet it are on our Topkapı headset rule page.

Maslak is where Abdülhamid II lived before he became sultan, and the Administration's account of those years is unusually domestic: a modest family life, music lessons for his children, poems and compositions, and long hours in his own carpentry workshop.

That thread continues at the Palace Collections Museum by Dolmabahçe, which shows personal belongings of Abdülhamid II brought from Yıldız Palace, among them his carpentry tools and the phaeton he used. A group that has heard about the workshop at Maslak recognises the tools when it reaches the museum.

The visiting rules list a combined ticket for Dolmabahçe Palace together with the European-side pavilions and museum: Aynalıkavak, Maslak, Ihlamur and the Palace Collections Museum (article 9). Combined tickets are valid for 30 days, and each venue can be entered once in that time. The MüzeKart, the card Turkish citizens use, is valid here: the rules accept it across the National Palaces (article 12), and Maslak is not on the Administration's list of exceptions.

Maslak lies well north of the others, about 9 km from Dolmabahçe as the crow flies. In a programme it is a stop of its own rather than one more door on the Bosphorus line.