Digital subscriptions

Buy or gift a digital subscription and get access to the complete digital archive of every issue for just £18.99 / $23.99 / €21.99 a year.

Buy/gift a digital subscription Login to the Digital Edition

Man about town

Thomas Roueché on a new kind of package tourism for the connoisseur

For those of us used to travelling back from Istanbul, the suitcase filled to the brim with delicacies requested by friends is all too familiar. So-called bavul ticareti (suitcase commerce) – a term born of Turkey’s flourishing trade with the former Iron Curtain – has taken on a new meaning. For example, my mother won’t allow me to return without at least two large bottles of triple-distilled rakı, a tub of Aegean olives, and fish eggs (balık yumurtası). The nieces’ faces still light up with mirth at the mention of pickle juice (from the Cihangir’s Asri Turşucu) after my Christmas wardrobe emerged stained a bright neon pink.

But today, shipping lanes are grinding to a halt and the price of oil is soaring. If, as looks likely, the price of flights continues to rise, bavul ticareti looks less and less sustainable. How then does the discerning shopper acquire goods, gifts and artworks at a distance? To the rescue come two unexpected endeavours…

Other Highlights from Cornucopia 70
  • A Journey to Rough Cilicia

    Barnaby Rogerson and the photographer Don McCullin set out from Turkey’s capital for Rough Cilicia


  • The Flowering of Europe

    Martyn and Alison Rix chronicle Turkey’s extraordinary botanical legacy


  • Back from the Brink

    This grand mansion, an Ottoman outpost on the remote southern peninsula of Datça, was rotting away when it was rescued by an enterprising new owner. It has now regained every inch of its early-19th-century charm. By Rupert Scott. Photographs by Monica Fritz


  • The Lion of Leighton House

    Frederick Leighton’s abiding love of the East permeates his entire mansion-cum-studio in Holland Park

  • Seeing the light

    A new exhibition turns the limelight on Halil Pasha, pioneer of Turkish impressionism. By Ayla Jean Yackley



  • Out of the Shadows

    A show that turns the spotlight on two women painters eclipsed by their artist husbands

  • Cut to Cannes

    A new exhibition at the Ara Güler Museum follows Turkey’s adored photojournalist to the French Riviera


  • Bound to impress

    The beauty of bindings


  • The Garlic Crush

    Berrin Torolsan on the wonder bulb


  • Velvet and Steel

    Doyenne of curators, Nazan Ölçer, by Andrew Finkel



Buy the issue
Issue 70, Summer 2026 Outpost of Peace
£15.00 / $20.12 / 946.58 TL
Related Destinations
Cornucopia Digital Subscription

The Digital Edition

Cornucopia works in partnership with the digital publishing platform Exact Editions to offer individual and institutional subscribers unlimited access to a searchable archive of fascinating back issues and every newly published issue. The digital edition of Cornucopia is available cross-platform on web, iOS and Android and offers a comprehensive search function, allowing the title’s cultural content to be delved into at the touch of a button.

Digital Subscription: £18.99 / $23.99 (1 year)

Subscribe now