Çakıroğlu İsmail Ağa Konağı

Çakıroğlu İsmail Ağa Konağı is a large stone mansion rising on a hill overlooking the sea in the Sıraağaç neighbourhood of Of, known locally by its old name Çalek. Wikipedia introduces it as the building regarded as the largest stone mansion in the Black Sea Region. It was built by Çakıroğlu İsmail Ağa, one of the powerful notables of the Of area in the early 19th century. Although the page of the Trabzon Provincial Directorate of Culture and Tourism lists the settlement under the Hayrat district, reflecting an older administrative tie, the neighbourhood belongs to Of today. Sources give different construction dates. The Ministry of Culture and Tourism's Trabzon page states that the mansion was built in the Hijri year 1237, that is 1821. According to information quoted from the January 2004 issue of the magazine Of'un Sesi, the Hijri date 1235 on one of the fireplaces corresponds to 1819. Turkish Wikipedia, on the other hand, says the mansion is estimated to have been completed around 1805. The safest statement is therefore that the mansion was built in the first quarter of the 19th century. According to accounts, its construction took six years and forty master builders worked on it. The most striking thing about the mansion is its stone. The building is largely made of pink cut stone, brought from a quarry two to two and a half kilometres away. The plan is a near-square symmetrical layout; Wikipedia gives the footprint as 529 square metres and the living area as about 1500 square metres. The north facade facing the sea has two storeys and small windows, while the south facade rises to three storeys. The second and third floors on the south facade are decorated with woodwork. The arrangement of the entrances is also balanced. The main doors open opposite each other to the west and the east, and there is a third door in the very middle of the south facade. On the east side there is also a door used by horses. On the ground floor, on the west side, there is a room where guests were received and right next to it an armoury. The middle floor holds the kitchen, where food was cooked in huge cauldrons, and a broad inner courtyard divided in two by doors. The upper floor is where the family lived and consists of many rooms. According to the description in Of'un Sesi, there is a carved centrepiece in the middle of the third floor, and between the roof and this floor there is an inner roof woven like a basket from rhododendron branches. Wooden shutters on the south facade were closed against the winter cold. The presence of a prison room on the ground floor shows that the mansion was not only a home but also a seat of local authority. Wikipedia writes that, as in many mansions of the region, decisions concerning the administration of the area were made on this middle floor. Little of the decoration has survived, but what remains is fine. According to the Trabzon Metropolitan Municipality's page on mansions, apart from three carved door leaves and the stone fireplace niches, no notable decorative elements remain. An old local website also mentions a dome-shaped fireplace of green cut stone, a door carved like wickerwork and a door decorated with bunches of grapes. The wooden interior of the mansion remained worn by damp and time for a long period. The building's history is bound up with the conflicts of the Of area in the 19th century. According to Wikipedia, during the conflict between the Hazinedaroğlu and Tuzcuoğlu families, Tuzcuoğlu Memiş Ağa took refuge with Çakıroğlu İsmail Ağa in 1817. During the First World War the mansion was shelled from the sea by Russian warships but suffered very little damage. Faint traces of these shots can still be made out on some of the stones. The mansion was repaired in 1979 by the General Directorate of Antiquities and Museums. According to Wikipedia, in 2017 ownership was handed over by an association to the Trabzon Governorate, the restoration project was completed in 2018 and repair work has been under way since 2019. The mansion is planned to be used as a guest house. For this reason, before you go, ask the Of District Governorate or the Provincial Directorate of Culture and Tourism whether the interior is open to visitors. Even from the outside, the mansion deserves a long stop. Walk around the building to see the transition between the stone body and the timber-framed upper floors, and look at how the number of storeys increases on the south side compared with the north. Thanks to its hilltop position, the view from the front of the mansion over the coast of Of and the sea is as impressive as the building itself. The neighbourhood is reached by a short road trip from the centre of Of; because the local roads are narrow and steep, it is easier to leave the car in a suitable place and walk the last stretch. On the same day you can continue along the Solaklı Valley to Çaykara and the Sultan Murat Plateau.