Palazzo Corpi

Introducing you to.....

the VERY FIRST

US Government owned diplomatic property abroad,

AND the first and only one to be won in a poker game!!

(sadly no flag flys above the Eagle anymore, but you can use your imagination)

the Eagle was added to the mansion in the early 1900's

(side view below)

The Palazzo Corpi was commissioned to be built as a residence, by a wealthy shipping magnate in the 1870's (thus the last name Corpi, that it bears). It took nearly the entire decade to complete, and he died shortly thereafter. His nephews inherited it, and rented it to the US Government only a few years later in 1882. Thus, making "us" it's only occupant for most of it's time-covering over 120 years and almost half of America's life as a country at the time it moved. It really has a terrific history, and if you want you can read more details here.

For the rest of you though...the story goes that the Ambassador in 1907 happened to be a business partner of Andrew Carnegie, thus helping him to have plenty of his own funds to spend. He thought it was ridiculous that the Government didn't own any property overseas and so he purchased it with his own money. He assumed that they would pay him back for his smart choice, but instead they told him that he had made that purchase all on his own! Not wanting to be out the money, he set up a clever poker game with "key members" of Congress, and from what I gather kind of hustled them into thinking he couldn't play poker. He then proposed that if he won the next hand that they (Congress) would agree to pay him back for the building. They of course agreed, and of course he then actually won! So there you have it, "the debt of Honor was accordingly paid by Congress", and they were the proud new owners of an Embassy!

We were recently given the special opportunity to take a private tour of the Palazzo Corpi. This was a pretty rare opportunity, being that only a handful of people have gotten to go back inside since it was "de-comissioned" as the official US Consulate (and previously US Embassy) in Istanbul. The Consulate moved to a new and more secure location in 2003. The Government still owns the Palazzo, but has since rented it out to be completely restored and renovated into a swanky 5-star hotel with all it's original historical charm. I'm sure it will be plenty spendy when it is done, but we are planning now to save our pennies and come back some day and stay here! It is a "Class 1" historical building, meaning that by law it must be expertly restored on both the inside and outside. I'm sure it will be incredible! I can't wait.

I loved all the details on the outside. The Lions are terrific!

These are inside the main hall on the first floor. Much of the building was still shuttered up to not damage the paint any further, especially in this room...so I tried my best to get decent pictures in the dark! Most of the depictions throughout the building are scenes from mythology and the gods and godesses, etc.

Looking towards the grand staircase, the details everywhere were just beautiful!!

Now this staircase by itself is apparently worth several hundred thousand dollars. Not too shabby!

More beautiful rooms and frescos...

These are views of the top floor central hall. You can see where they are starting to try to restore, and figure out what colors and images were there. The central skylight was amazing though. My favorite of the entire place for sure!

In it's day this was the Consul General's Office, also not too shabby!

(Although the dark green isn't really my first choice for wall color)

Little "sunroom" or something of the sort, but leading to the balcony.

Now we are out in the back. If you'll notice the tops of these two pine trees...they are missing. In the late 90's there was an attempted attack with some "sprocket propeller geranadines" (if you can get my code there- I just don't feel like having my blog pop up when people google those kinds of things) ha! Anyway, those thankfully missed the building and landed across the street but took off the tops of the trees nicely! yikes!

The Chancery was added in 1910 as an addition.

I enjoyed the dragon

This is us on the roof of the Chancery, it had a beautiful view of the water as you can see!

Now from what we were able to deduce, even though they have changed some of the positions in the departments, etc. we think this is where Noah's office would most likely have been if they had not moved to the new Consulate. (Shared with a couple of people I think). It's hard to tell with all the dust and dirt on the floors as well, but the floors are absolutely gorgeous! I am hoping that they will all be refinished to their former glory! I guess when you don't take good care of a building for a while it tends to look pretty bad pretty quick!

View from the window- you can't beat it!

One last shot of another beautiful ceiling (sadly our "efficient" electrical work probably wasn't the best for it) Luckily they had the sense to glue mostly around the main center art.

Here is a final view from across the street. It is such a beautiful building, yet as you can see with the fence and street being so close to it....times have changed and they needed to move it to a better location. Either way, I'm thrilled that we got the chance to check it out and hear the fun stories of the people who had worked there in the past! Also, SO thankful to our sweet friend Angie for babysitting! It was so great to have a little time sans kiddo!

For future reference also to any diplos that might be in the area and want to find it just for fun, it is directly across from the Pera Palas Hotel (of Agatha Christie, and Orient Express fame) if you feel like killing two birds with one stone! They are both amazing and well worth a trip to check them out if you are in Istanbul!