The Sabancı Museum is located in Istanbul, one of the oldest settlements of the Bosphorus, in Emirgan. The villa which was used as a museum was built by Italian architect Edouard De Nari by Prince Mehmed Ali Hasan in 1927 and the Prince’s family used it as a summer house for many years and later served as an embassy of Montenegro.
The pavilion, which was purchased by Princess İffet from the Hidiv family in 1950 by Adana businessman Haci Omer Sabancı, started to be called as the Horse Pavilion because of the placement of the horse sculpture made in 1864 in the pavilion garden. The other horse sculpture found in the mansion is the cast of one of the four attan, dating from 1204, located in front of the San Marco Church in Venice.
The pavilion, which was started to be used by Sakıp Sabancı after the loss of Hacı Ömer Sabancı’s life, has been transferred to Sabancı University in order to be transformed into a museum together with the products contained since 1998.
Since 2002, the museum has opened its doors to visitors and has been given international standards after various expansion processes. The wealthy collection that it contains has brought a multi-faceted museum understanding with activities such as various exhibitions, training programs, conferences and seminars.
Sakıp Sabancı Museum Visit Times
Visiting Days and Hours: You can visit the museum except Mondays. You can visit on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays from 10:00 am to 6:00 pm, Wednesdays and Saturdays from 10:00 am to 22:00 pm.
Works Exhibited in the Museum
Book Arts and Hat Collection: Sakıp Sabancı, Sultan II. He started to make a collection by buying the plate written by Mahmud. In addition to his various works he has done, the collection has been enriched with various works purchased in the 1980’s. Starting from 2002, the mansion which welcomes the visitors as a museum, has begun to be exhibited on the upper floor in the halls where you can see examples of books and calligraphy art from the Ottoman period. You can also see Ottoman sultans’ monks, official documents and calligraphers used by calligraphers in these halls.
Painting Collection: Works of foreign artists working in Istanbul are exhibited in this section where various painters and artists’ works from the last period of Ottoman period are exhibited. The works exhibited in the museum, which is frequently found in the works between 1850 and 1950, are extremely diverse. The main artists in the collection are; The works of artists such as Raphael, Osman Hamdi Bey, Süleyman Sayyid, Konstantin Kapıdağlı, Şeker Ahmed Pasha, Süleyman Seyyid, Nazmi Ziya Guran, Fikret Mualla, Fausto Zonaro and Ivan Ayvazovski are exhibited.
Furniture and Decorative Works Collection: The three rooms on the entrance floor of the mansion are furnished with furniture and various decorative artworks used by the Sabancı Family during their living here