On a recent tripette, to Istanbul, Mr and Mrs That's Not My Age found; gorgeous ceramic baubles, trinkets, beautiful mosques, pomegranates by the cartload, as well as modern cafés, bars, boutique hotels and the latest edition to the Condé Nast stable, Turkish Vogue - with famous Turkish model, Jessica Stam on the cover. Now, I'll say no more about that little cultural conundrum but the Jezebel website sums it up nicely here....
Look beyond the cover and there's a lovely feature listing twentieth century Vogue fashion shoots in Turkey. Shot by the likes of Cecil Beaton, Irving Penn and David Bailey - so what if the cover of the first issue was photographed in New York by Patrick Demarchelier?
We took a trip to Istanbul Modern, apparently named after the Tate in London but in a serious case of of one-upmanship, this museum has a painted, red carpet leading up to the entrance. Oh how we enjoyed our little stroll along the walkway of fame - and are even thinking of recreating the look in the entrance to our apartment block.
We discovered that the Turkish are animal lovers. There are more cats in Istanbul than mosques, and on our sightseeing tour we encountered a pack of wild dogs and a very clever Easter bunny:
According to the Financial Times, Turkey has the potential to be like Milan in five years time, well, they already have the maniac car drivers and the smog. Aside from being European city of culture 2010, Turkey has it's own fashion week with loads of talented designers including Tween and Desa. (Click here to read ace blogger Disney Roller Girl's piece on Tween), designer stores and shopping malls (which we didn't visit, this was a cultural visit, after all) - and the provocatively named boutique, Midnight Express which stocks Turkish designer Bora Aksu (who shows at London/Paris fashion weeks), and has a fine line in slogan t-shirts:
But our favourite shops were the junk shops in Beyoglu - where we discovered how rubbish we were at haggling - and paid over the odds for our only souvenir:
A globe without a stand (to add to our collection, more on this coming soon). The man in the shop claimed the hanging globe was his idea but a little trip to the Pera Museum told us otherwise:
Do you have any tips on haggling? If so, please share them. And what's your favourite holiday souvenir?