Besiktas Hotels: The Bosphorus Shore

Besiktas has two faces. Along the water runs the imperial waterfront: Dolmabahce Palace, whose halls and visiting rules are covered at dolmabahcesarayi.com, then a string of former palaces and gardens now operating as hotels, and further on the mosque-front square of Ortakoy under the Bosphorus bridge. Inland and uphill, carsi Besiktas is a compact grid of cheap eateries, bars and the football club's stadium, driven by a large student population. Visitors sleeping in the five-stars often miss the market quarter entirely, which is their loss; it is one of the easiest places in Istanbul to eat well without a reservation.

This district is Istanbul's luxury shelf. The waterfront properties are destination hotels: palace wings with Bosphorus lawns, tower hotels with club floors, spas and ballroom capacity that hosts much of the city's high-end wedding and conference calendar. Room rates here top the city, and strait-view rooms carry a premium over land-view rooms in the same building. Behind the shore, a thinner band of four-star and apart-hotel options serves business travelers who want the postcode without the flagship bill. Budget stock is minimal; this is the wrong district for cheap beds.

Besiktas has no metro station of its own on the shore, which surprises first-timers. The pattern is short hops: buses and taxis run the coastal road, the Kabatas interchange with its T1 tram and F1 funicular sits just south of Dolmabahce, and the busy Besiktas ferry pier connects to Kadikoy and Uskudar on the Asian side. For meetings in the Levent and Maslak towers, the M2 metro at Gayrettepe is a short taxi uphill, with the line map at Metro Istanbul. Gayrettepe also ends the M11 line from Istanbul Airport, which makes this one of the quickest premium districts to reach after landing; see the airport transport page for the numbered route.

Book Besiktas for honeymoons and anniversary trips, for anyone whose picture of Istanbul is a room over the water, and for business travelers working the Levent-Maslak corridor who want better evenings than an office district offers. It also suits event guests attending weddings or conferences in the shore hotels. Skip it on a tight budget, and skip it if you expect to walk to the Old City monuments; Sultanahmet is a 30 to 40 minute ride, and sightseeing-first trips are better served by Sultanahmet or Sirkeci. For the corporate towers themselves, compare Sisli before deciding.