Contemporan

Sumahan sits on the very edge of the Bosphorus straits which separate Europe from Asia and link the cold waters of the Black Sea to the warm waters of the Sea of Marmara and the Aegean beyond. The Bosphorus feeds the heart and spirit of the city.

It was built in the mid-nineteenth century to produce "suma" the unadulterated spirit used to make raki, the Ottomans' favourite tipple. Where today a motorized launch ferries hotel guests to and rom downtown, barges laden with figs would arrive to keep the stills of the Sumahan busy.