Pera Museum is one of the first private museums of İstanbul that hosts a range of Orientalist paintings showing details from the daily lives of Ottoman Women. In a culture that segregated sexes in all walks of life and making the veil mandatory for women, it is remarkable that we have a collection of these paintings that show us how women dressed and lived like more than a century ago during the Empire but we also know that most of these women were either non-muslims living in the Ottoman Empire or they were foreign women or women from non-muslim minorities who posed for the artists in oriental costumes usually worn by Ottoman women.
Museum is inside an old Beyoğlu building which used to be the legendary Bristol Hotel. The Museum is open except for mondays so definitely pay a visit to be transported to a world before us. The Museum is rather small but with a rich collection and a lovely cafe that hosts the first piano of Maria Callas. Don’t miss it!
Have a glance at the rich and colourful costumes, head dresses and jewellery of our ancestors who lived in a completely different aesthetic world. I can not stop feeling amazed by the details, richness, refinement and elegance of Ottoman women’s costumes in contrast to the simplicity, functionality and anonymity of our contemporary costumes.
And thanks to Pera Museum for having created such a rich collection to render the world before us visible!
