London opens exhibition 'From Constantinople to Istanbul: One City, Two Empires'

About 200 artefacts spanning 1,600 years of Istanbul's history

The Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) in London has opened the exhibition 'From Constantinople to Istanbul: One City, Two Empires', dedicated to the city's nearly 1,600-year history across the Byzantine and Ottoman periods and its influence on European art, culture and everyday life. Anadolu reports this. The exhibition features about 200 artefacts from museums and private collections in Turkey and other countries; it will run until 9 May 2027. Curators Bella Radenovic and Tim Stanley emphasised the city's multinational heritage and its influence on European culture.

Central exhibits and Ottoman luxury

The central theme of the exhibition is the conquest of Constantinople in 1453 by Sultan Mehmed II, which marked the end of the Byzantine Empire. The anchor of the collection is the 1480 portrait of Sultan Mehmed II by Gentile Bellini — a symbol of early diplomacy between Venice and Istanbul. Also on display are a 17-metre processional scroll from the 17th century and a dome-shaped box for the Quran from the late 16th century. The pinnacle of luxury is a 16th-century royal kaftan, believed to have belonged to Sultan Selim II, woven from zerbaft — silk with gold threads. Also exhibited are glazed blue-and-white tiles from a hammam, red silk wrappings and wooden footstools with mother-of-pearl inlay.

Byzantine treasures and their 'afterlife'

The section on the Eastern Roman Empire, designed by Radenovic beneath a dome inspired by the geometry of Hagia Sophia, brings together 6th-century liturgical objects from the era of Justinian: a double-sided processional cross and a censer shaped like a miniature church. Also here are treasures looted during the Fourth Crusade in 1204 and kept in the Basilica of St Mark in Venice, including the gilded votive crown of Emperor Leo VI, originally intended for the altar of Hagia Sophia. According to Radenovic, some objects were repurposed: the censer with perforated domes was turned into a reliquary upon arrival in Venice, and the Basilica of St Mark itself, she said, was modelled on the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople.

Influence on everyday Europe and the city's cosmopolitanism

The curators deliberately focused on the later centuries of Ottoman rule — the 17th, 18th and 19th — which, they say, often remain overlooked in museum presentations of the empire. This period brought coffeehouses and bath culture that influenced European daily life: Stanley pointed to the influence of Turkish towels and tiled domestic bathrooms on modern Western homes. The exhibition also reflects Istanbul's cosmopolitan character after the Ottoman conquest: Mehmed II encouraged resettlement to the capital, established the Greek Orthodox and Armenian patriarchates, and welcomed Sephardic Jews fleeing persecution in Spain and Portugal. The first printers in Istanbul, according to Stanley, were Jews; material evidence of this is a printed Torah from 1546. The modern era is represented by lithographs of Hagia Sophia by Gaspare Fossati from 1852 and Osman Hamdi Bey's 1887 painting 'Ladies Out Walking'.

'A window into the other half of Europe'

The exhibition presents Istanbul not as a city squeezed between East and West, but as a cultural centre that continuously influenced both worlds. Stanley said he hopes international visitors will leave with a deeper understanding of a part of European history that often goes unnoticed, opening 'a window into the other half of Europe'. Radenovic noted: 'Istanbul has always been a very diverse and cosmopolitan place... thanks to its strategic location it attracted many merchants, as well as the most remarkable craftsmen and craftswomen'.