Golestan Palace, the “Iranian Versailles”, damaged by Israeli-American strikes

The Golestan Palace in Tehran, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was hit by Israeli-American strikes on the Iranian capital, the country’s media said on Monday March 2. “Following the joint American-Israeli attack (…) in southern Tehran on Sunday evening, the Golestan Palace (…) was partly damaged”indicated the Iranian news agency (ISNA), specifying that windows, doors and mirrors had been hit by the shock waves. The Mehr news agency reported similar information.

Residence of the Qajar dynasty, the palace is an artistic and decorative manifesto, revealing jewelry rooms, state rooms, colorful tiles, niches decorated with birds or the effigy of princes. Golestan, name meaning “rose garden”has eight different structures, organized around flower beds and ponds. Built in the 16th century^e century, remodeled in the 18th^e century and the 19th^e century, it is a sort of Palace of Versailles for the Persian world.

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Nasir al-Din Shah, who reigned from 1848 to 1896, was the first Iranian ruler to have made several trips to Europe, including to Paris during the Universal Exhibition of 1889. He expanded the palace, opened galleries and wings. He will imagine the Hall of Mirrors, inspired by the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles, rubbing shoulders with the 18th^e French and Persian arts.

After the Qajars, the Pahlavi dynasty (1925-1979), the latest, will partially destroy the palace (in favor of the famous gray buildings), and move the center of power to the north of Tehran. The Golestan will only be used for official receptions, including the coronation of the last shah, in 1967, organized in the Hall of Mirrors. In the wake of the Islamic Revolution in 1979, the palace was “put under cover”only to reopen to the public in 1998. It was not until 2013 that UNESCO listed it as a world heritage site.