The history and features of Skating Palas
Beyoğlu’s vibrant center saw the opening of Istanbul’s first major skating hall in 1909, when Skating Palas opened in the garden of the opulent Cercle d’Orient building, a late nineteenth-century masterpiece. As its name suggests, it was a palace dedicated to skating, although the activity was on wheels rather than ice. Skating Palas quickly became one of the city’s most fashionable social hubs. A live orchestra played waltzes, skaters glided in sync with the music as if dancing, and spectators sat at nearby tables. Istanbul’s elite visited regularly. Besides the large rink, the venue hosted hockey games, frequent balls, concerts, and various performances. The Saturday roller hockey matches drew energetic crowds and generated excitement comparable to that of football games. Before Skating Palas, the same grounds housed a gymnasium run by trainer Strangali, later followed by a circus troupe led by an equestrian acrobat. This record shows that entertainment and sports have long been connected in the area. Skating Palas continued this tradition and helped popularize roller skating between 1909 and 1915. World War I and social changes soon brought this skating palace’s life to an end. By 1918, the hall had closed, and a new theater, the New Theatre, took its place. For a deeper look into the story of Skating Palas, you can read Gökhan Akçura’s detailed article on the subject.
The skating teams of major clubs
Early in the twentieth century, skating was extremely popular in Istanbul, prompting major sports clubs like Galatasaray and Fenerbahçe to form their own teams. Roller hockey, the indoor version of modern ice hockey played on wheels, made its debut in the city in 1910 with a demonstration game at Skating Palas in Beyoğlu. The first Turkish club to officially adopt the sport was Galatasaray. By 1911, roller hockey activities had begun within Galatasaray Sports Club. Students from Galatasaray High School would go to the nearby rink to skate, a habit that helped the sport gain popularity within the club. Three years later, in 1914, the club’s main rival, Fenerbahçe, also became interested in skating and started practicing once they had access to suitable open space. However, the club’s official roller hockey team wasn’t formed until 1923. That same year, Galatasaray, Fenerbahçe, Nişantaşı, and Vefa competed in the first league matches. For a brief time, roller hockey was an organized sport in Istanbul. Still, its early run in Türkiye was short-lived, with organized play lasting only two seasons among Turkish clubs, and by the mid-1920s, the sport had quietly disappeared from the official sports calendar.
Popular culture and the place of skating in literature
Skating Palas and the wave of skating enthusiasm surrounding it had a lasting impact on Turkish popular culture and literature. From the mid-twentieth century onward, many writers and publications depicting old Istanbul life reminisced about those roller-skating days in Beyoğlu. Journalist and author Sermet Muhtar Alus, for example, mentioned Skating Palas in an article published in the “Akşam” newspaper on June 22, 1932. Humorist Refik Halid Karay also referenced Beyoğlu’s skating scene in his various memoirs and short stories. By the 1930s and 1940s, roller-skating balls and soirées had already become fond memories for longtime Istanbulites. As a tangible remnant of Skating Palas’s cultural legacy, an apartment building on the side street next to Cercle d’Orient was named “İsketing Apartmanı.” The name was intended to keep alive the memory of the city’s renowned skating palace. In Istanbul’s urban culture, “Skating Palas” continues to appear in literary works and recollections as a symbol of that vibrant era in the early twentieth century when Westernization and entertainment intertwined. Its echoes still sometimes surface in modern popular culture. In Cem Yılmaz’s film “Arif v 216,” the skateboard club sequence playfully reimagines the youth culture and leisure habits of early-century Beyoğlu.
Skating sports today and their legacy
Old roller-skating halls no longer exist in Türkiye, but skating remains a part of daily life in various forms. The ice rink that opened in 1989 at Galleria Mall in Ataköy marked the start of a new era. Soon after, it became a hub for skating schools, hockey games, and artistic performances. Ice hockey received official recognition in the 1990s; the federation was established in 1991, and the Super League began in the 1992–93 season. Today, about five teams based in Istanbul, Ankara, and Izmir compete, with clubs such as Zeytinburnu Buz Adaları SK and Büyükşehir Belediye Ankaraspor being notable examples. Since the 2000s, national teams have participated in international tournaments, and Turkish athletes have also started competing on the world stage in figure skating.
Roller skating, meanwhile, has mostly persisted as a solo activity and a part of street culture. Long stretches of the Istanbul shoreline, such as Maltepe, Caddebostan, Bakırköy, and Beşiktaş, fill up with young skaters and skateboarders on weekend afternoons and early evenings. Festivals organized by municipalities and private groups, along with skate and roller parks, bring together a growing community of enthusiasts.
Ultimately, even if Skating Palas no longer exists as a physical venue in today’s Istanbul, the spirit of entertainment and sport it once embodied continues to live on in new ways.
