Cendere Art Museum

Cendere Art Museum, formerly known as Cendere Hamidiye Pump Station, was built in 1902 by master craftsmen and engineers brought from France for the purpose of transferring the spring waters collected in its reservoirs to Istanbul.

History

Cendere Hamidiye Pump Station was constructed in the Huzur neighborhood of Istanbul's Şişli district (now Sarıyer) to distribute the spring waters accumulated in the facility's reservoirs to Istanbul and entered service on 31 August 1902. For the construction of the building, which measures 35 metres in width and 25 metres in height, master craftsmen and engineers were brought from France. The boilers inside the station were manufactured by Escher-Wyss & Cie., based in Switzerland. It has been noted that in the 1960s the steam machines were moved to the Terkos Old Water Pump Station and electric water pumps were installed at Cendere Hamidiye Pump Station. The station, which at its opening was said to pump 1,200 m³ of water per day to 126 fountains in the city, supplied water to four fountains in the 1990s. Over time, the chimney of the building also collapsed, and analyses carried out by the Istanbul Water and Sewerage Administration (İSKİ) determined that the water was becoming increasingly polluted. For these reasons, after the 1999 Gölcük earthquake, İSKİ worked on maintaining the station's function and simultaneously restructuring it as a social and cultural facility.

Restoration works

At the request of İSKİ, various restoration works such as the repair of the water tanks located at the station, strengthening of the structure, and removal of later additions were approved by the Istanbul 1st Cultural Heritage Protection Regional Board's decision No. 13319 dated 31 October 2001. Within the scope of this project, the main building was transformed into a main structure containing exhibition, seminar, map and library rooms as well as administrative units. Restoration work, which began in October 2006 under the name Istanbul Water Civilizations Museum, was completed in 2009. Some trees in the garden, such as the western plane tree numbered 933, have been registered as monument trees. However, the building that completed restoration and received museum permission did not open until 2022.

In 2022, the building, restored by İBB Miras under the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality, was opened as the Cendere Art Museum.