Opening hours, prices and tickets for places worth your time.
The Turkish and Islamic Arts Museum occupies the palace of Grand Vizier Pargalı İbrahim Pasha, built around 1524 on the west side of the Hippodrome. Founded in 1914 and moved here in 1983, it shows carpets, calligraphy and Qurans, tiles, woodwork and metalwork from across the Islamic world, and an ethnographic section with reconstructed nomad tents and village rooms.
The Basilica Cistern is an underground reservoir built under Emperor Justinian I in the 6th century to supply the Great Palace and nearby buildings. Its brick vaults, covering about 140 by 70 metres, rest on 336 marble columns nine metres high, and walkways lead over the water to two Medusa heads reused as column bases. A restoration completed in 2022 reopened it as a museum.
Hagia Irene stands in the outer courtyard of Topkapı Palace and is the oldest known church building in Istanbul; the present brick structure dates from Justinian I's rebuilding after 532. Never turned into a mosque, it served the Ottomans as an arsenal and is now a museum and concert venue, with a large black cross from the Iconoclast period in the apse.
The Istanbul Archaeology Museums in Gülhane, beside Topkapı Palace, group three buildings: the Neoclassical Archaeological Museum by Alexandre Vallaury, opened in 1891, the Museum of the Ancient Orient and the Tiled Kiosk of 1472. Expanded under director Osman Hamdi Bey, the collection includes the Alexander Sarcophagus and other finds from the royal necropolis of Sidon.
Istanbul Modern opened in 2004 as Turkey's first museum of modern and contemporary art and moved in 2023 into a new building by Renzo Piano on the Karaköy waterfront, within the Galataport complex. It shows its collection of Turkish art from the 20th century onwards and its photography collection alongside temporary exhibitions, with a cinema and a library.
The Maiden's Tower stands on a small islet at the southern entrance of the Bosphorus, 200 metres off the Üsküdar shore. Fortified by the Byzantines, who stretched a chain from it across the strait in the 12th century, it was rebuilt several times under the Ottomans and served as a lighthouse; after a restoration it reopened in 2023 as a museum reached by boat from Salacak.
Vizgu uses necessary technologies to make the site work. With your permission, we also use optional technologies to remember features and measure affiliate ticket referrals. We currently use no general analytics or advertising trackers. You can accept, reject or choose categories, and change your choice at any time through Cookie preferences in the footer.
