This three-storey building complex, with a closed arrangement centred around an internal courtyard, is comprised of four wings with orthogonal facades.
The building was constructed in 1885 and was purchased by the Régie (the Ottoman tobacco monopoly), or “Rezi” as the locals call it, in 1892. The company had the exclusive right to distribute tobacco for domestic consumption and also the exclusive right to the industrial production of various types of cigarette in four centres: Istanbul, Thessaloniki, Samsun and Izmir. The tobacco workers’ strike of 1896 known as “ekmek kavgasi” (fight for bread) took place in this tobacco warehouse.
Its current owners have converted the tobacco complex into a modern shopping mall.
