Mansions and private mansions to visit Tunisia

Built on the hillside, it is part of the national heritage, as is the Café des Mats or the Chaabane. In the shopping street there are craftsmen and souvenir merchants, restaurants and pizzerias. To reach the village, you will have to leave your car on the parking lot, already attacked by the souvenir shops. Paved streets climb along beautiful houses for moucharabiehs purposes, graceful iron arabesques, and where all shades of bougainvilleas attract a happy eye.

The Chammakhi brothers decided one day to revive the family home. It was the first to open its doors to the public, a sort of free living museum. The family, of Djerbian and Berber origin, settled in the medina at the end of the 15th century. Just a stone's throw from the Great Mosque, the land was tiny. It was unthinkable to build an Arabo-Andalusian building with a patio, etc. So they erected an elaborate house, high up on five levels. The house is now converted into a boutique-museum... where everything is for sale!

Built at the end of the 18th century. The grandfather of Mr. Annabi, the current owner, was a mufti and people came to consult him at any time. Embellished and refurbished as a summer residence during the 20th century, this house is now a museum. The patio, in Andalusian style, has a fountain in its center. Some of the rooms are real museums showing the life of the past. There is still a prayer room, a library, a handicraft store and a large exotic garden. The reception is cold and it's a pity.

Set of aristocratic villas. One of them, named the Volière because of a beautiful mosaic that paved the courtyard, is a peristyle villa with a splendid view of the beach. A stone path following the ancient Roman streets will lead you there. Below it, another villa called "de la Rotonde" has a similar layout and, on the other side of the street, another house called "du cryptoportico" with its beautiful garden has been restored. They are a testimony of the luxury in which the aristocrats of the city lived.

This splendid residence was built at the end of the 16th century by the wealthy Othman Dey, who wanted a quiet place to live in peace, and occupied it until his death in 1610. Dar Othman has a facade with marble columns, a patio surrounded by porticoes with two-colored pointed arches and Moorish-style colonnades. Both sober and magnificent, the decoration borrows the most beautiful materials (marble, ceramics) without being ostentatious. An interior garden replaced the paving of the courtyard in 1936. The site is unfortunately not always open.