Kordon Promenade

The Kordon is İzmir's promenade along the Gulf of İzmir, stretching from Konak Square north through the Alsancak district for about two kilometres. Lined with cafés, restaurants, and tea gardens, with the Aegean visible across the water and the distant outline of mountains on the opposite shore, it is one of the most pleasant waterfront walks in Turkey.

The Kordon is at its best in the early evening, when the whole city seems to be out walking, cycling, or sitting at the café tables watching the sea. The light on the bay at sunset is exceptional — İzmir faces west, so the sky turns gold and pink directly over the water. Alsancak, the residential and nightlife district behind the Kordon, is worth exploring too: wine bars, good restaurants, and an art cinema.

things to do sight alsancak
A story
The Kordon was constructed over the site of İzmir's old harbour jetties in the early twentieth century, after the catastrophic fire of 1922 that destroyed much of the city's historic waterfront. The Levantine merchants and Greek families who had dominated commercial İzmir for generations were gone after the fire, and the new Kordon — wide, orderly, lined with palm trees — was partly a statement about the character of the new Turkish republic.