Beylerbeyi Palace (Saray''), is located in Istanbul in Uskudar. It is at the Asian side of Istanbul and sits right next to the Bosphorus. It was first thought to be a guesthouse for foreign statesman that are visiting Istanbul as well as a summer house for Ottoman Sultans. Palace was built with the request of Sultan Suleyman Abdulaziz in 6th of August, 1863.
THE ARCHITECT
The palace took three years to be built, construction started at 1861 and it was completed in 1865.Head designer and builder of the building was from the famous arcihtect Armenian Balyan family, Sarkis Balyan. Sarkis Balyan was only 26 years old when he built Beylerbeyi Saray''. Even though he was working with his father Garabet Amira Balyan for this project, this was still an important accomplishment for a young architect.
LOCATION
The area that the palace was built on was always a preferred place and has a long history of buildings all the way to Byzantium Empire. Before the palace was built, a tunnel under the Palace in Beylerbeyi, Uskudar, was built there with the request of Sultan Mahmud II. Tunell is 2.8 meters high and it was used until 1970 by everyone, then it was closed to become an exhibition by itself. Tunnel was later opened on September 19, 2016 to help traffic issues as it is right next to the Bosphorus Bridge.
GENERAL INFORMATION
Beylerbeyi Palace, which was first built as a summer house for Ottoman royalty, had a mixture of Renaissance, Baroque architectural styles as well as a east-west combination. With its complex architectural appearence, palace gets attention from everyone that goes by the bosphorus. But other than the main building, which is the summer palace of the Sultan, Beylerbeyi Palace is actually a whole complex of multiple buildings that are located in the site. There are three big and two small mansions which are for other occupants using the Palace.
Since Beylerbeyi is a summer palace, and it is for the highest members of all Ottoman Empire and their guests, has the best qualities a regular summer house should have. It has a high level of ornamentation, and a pool filled with sea water at ground floor which is covered with glass.
A general site plan of the complex can be seen in this image which shows all the mansions, gardens, pools, the main palace building. It can also be read from this image that the architect cared deeply about greenery and having a similar feeling of French gardens with geometrical shapes.
DESIGN ASPECTS
One of the most significant qualities of Ottoman Palaces is that they are added on after the general lines of the complex is decided on, so they get bigger and bigger with as the time goes by. But this was until the 19th century, it began to change with new movements.
'''As an effect that comes from its time of construction, Beylerbeyi Palace shows western architectural features clearly. It is a fact that 19th century in Europe was the start of industrial revolution for many countries. As a result of longing for the past and getting away from close neighbourhood relationships, architecture started to shift towards antiquity once again. Works of this era show clear representations of Greek, Roman architecture as well as renaissance and baroque details in action.'''
This effect of antiquity shows itself as a western architecture effect on Beylerbeyi Palace.
So, when inspected, it is obvious that Beylerbeyi Palace was designed as a whole complex from the beginning and nothing else was added on to the complex after it was completed. This was also something new from the young architect, as he changed the way things work and wanted to have control over everything that was inside the site.
But when doing so, Sarkis Balyan had a couple clear advantages unlike for example Dolmabahce Palace. Since Beylerbeyi was for summer only, it was significantly smaller. Even after they made it serve secondly as a guesthouse for foreigner statesman, its relatively small size was still enough. Secondly, since the Ottoman Sultan would be using this palace for short times, even in summer times since he had to be always in charge of everything as the ruler, only five mansions were thought to be enough for the whole Beylerbeyi complex. So even with these two advantageous points, Sarkis Balyan decided to design the whole complex with the help of his father and brother all before the construction, then decided that it was the final state the palace is going to be.
It is still unknown, why the palace is so out of place in the site plan and sits unrelated with none of the invisible guide lines that are created either by the gardens or the mansions. Some experts thought that, the original building was thought to be bigger and other think that they decided to put the palace right next to the sea afterwards.