Featured places
Mosques, caravanserais, souks, museums — and why they are worth the walk.
24 Places
Dar Rajab Pasha, Aleppo’s Palace of Culture
A 16th-century Ottoman mansion near Bab al-Faraj, now Aleppo’s Palace of Culture. In 2025 it hosted craft shows, qudud concerts and a festival. Hours unconfirmed.
Aleppo · Ottoman
Hamidiye Serail, Latakia
Latakia’s Ottoman government house, built in 1905 and named after Sultan Abdulhamid II. Today it is the police headquarters, so only the stone façade is seen.
Latakia · Ottoman, 1905 (reign of Abdulhamid II)
The Matbakh al-Ajami Palace
A 12th-century palace on the street from the Aleppo Citadel to the Great Mosque, under the largest surviving Ayyubid dome. It held a folk museum from 1967 to 1975.
Aleppo · Zengid — Ayyubid
Emir Abdelkader’s Summer Palace in Dummar
The two-storey summer house Emir Abdelkader built on the Barada during his Damascus exile; one source says he died here in 1883. Restored 2008; ask about access.
Damascus · Ottoman
Qasr al-Zahrawi, Homs
A Mamluk mansion in Homs dated 1262-1263, later the city’s folklore museum. A shell-vaulted iwan fills one side of the courtyard, with two carved lions facing it.
Homs · Mamluk, with Ottoman additions
The So-called Palace of Trajan in Bosra
Named after Trajan but built as a Byzantine residence: an 1850-square-metre courtyard house in Bosra, its three-apsed upper hall, and why the name is wrong.
Bosra · Byzantine
Roman Palace at Inkhil (Qasr Zain al-Abidin)
A Roman-era basalt mansion in Inkhil, north of Daraa: a reception hall split by a great arch, a stone-beam ceiling and rooms that were lived in until 1992.
Daraa · Roman
Villa Rose
A pink stone mansion of 1928 in the Aziziyah quarter, the first building in Aleppo to use European architecture undiluted. Private, seen from the street.
Aleppo · French mandate
The Grand Serail of Aleppo
The government house next to the citadel gate opened in 1933 and was destroyed in 2014. It was the largest public building Aleppo put up under the mandate.
Aleppo · French mandate — 1928 to 1933
The Syrian Parliament Building
Built on the Salihiyah road in 1928-1929 over an old cinema. French outside, Arab ornament inside; it is a working chamber, so only the front is on view.
Damascus · French Mandate
The Grand Serail of Damascus
The Grand Serail on the south side of Marjeh Square opened in 1900 as the governor’s seat. King Faysal and the French Mandate both ruled Damascus from it.
Damascus · Late Ottoman
The Palace of Justice, Damascus
Across from the Al-Hamidiyah Souq stands the building that has housed whoever ran Damascus since 1554: Ottoman governors, French commissioners, now courts.
Damascus · Ottoman — French Mandate — Republic