ALBOGARI HOUSE
Historic Family Home in the mountain city of Taif, Saudi Arabia
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This magnificent house was the summer residence for the ALBOGARI family during the early years of the 20th century. In the hot summer months they would leave Mecca and travel to Taif, the mountain city in Saudi Arabia. Being over 2,000m high it has a refreshingly cooler climate and has long been the place to summer for many.
A senior member of the family who was born in the house told me how he remembers as a child, counting down the days until they took the then 5 hour journey to their joyous summer home. Time would be spent playing in the orchards, swimming in the pools, eating fresh fruits and listening to stories that elderly family members would tell. Ladies would stay in the main house throughout the day while the men went over to the adjoining building, the Dewan. All the meals were prepared in the Dewan and brought over to the big house.
It is a large home with units for 8 families on the ground floor and larger reception rooms on the upper floor. The imposing reception hall features long stone benches where visitors could wait to be received. These are crowned with magnificent arches over the twin staircase. Plans were made for another floor (the ceiling above the staircase left intentionally unfinished in its bare wooden form) but it never came to be after the builder fell off the roof not long after the completion of the main house in 1924.
The house was considered very modern in its day with advanced hot water & wastewater systems. Whilst the ground floor has a simple blue & white palette, it does have ornate carvings above the internal walls. It’s on the upper floor that the elegant flourishes of beautifully painted flowers come into their own. The main reception room in particular is adorned with ribbon-like swags of gold and green, stunningly finished off with a striking turquoise ceiling. None of the windows have glass; the tilting wooden shutters alone provided privacy and flow of air.
The house is surrounded by gardens, each with their own purpose. There is even a ladies garden complete with ornate pool with seats that allowed one to sit comfortably in the water. Under these water benches large orange fish would hide. I’m told they were brought all the way from Lebanon. What a journey they would have had! Interestingly the shape of the pool is very similar to the pool at the front of Jubra Palace, another grand house of Taif.
Whilst the house alone is impressive, it’s the stories of those who spent their long summer months there that provide the sparkle. You can almost hear a breeze in the trees and the echo of children running along the pathways. The sound of chatter would carry over the walls, broken up by the odd splash of water. At night flickering light from the home cinema would escape from the upper reception room full of all ages, squeezed in along the long bench.
What a delight it must have been. No wonder there’s a special twinkle in my companions eye as he tells me the stories of carefree days gone by.
All rights reserved to Sands in Time. ©2023SandsInTime ©SaudiTravelNotes
