House Museum of Nobel Brothers in Baku Villa Petrolea, Absheron Region, Azerbaijan
4.5 (31 reviews) Spent Ranking #52 in Baku Speciality Museums
One of the city highlights
Villa Petrolea was built in Baku by Ludvig and Emanuel Nobel in the 1880s. They chose this location for their opulent mansion to be in the middle of their production fields to have better control and oversight of their oil production and their company Branobel. Several generations of Nobels lived and were born in this mansion. Today, the villa has been restored to its former glory by the Baku Nobel Heritage Fund, and serves as a museum that preserves and promotes the Nobel heritage, wider East-West relations, and shows the lives of quintessential oil barons.
Address
Nobel Avenue, 57/2 Behind Luna Park, Baku 1025 Azerbaijan
Mobile
Website
https://www.facebook.com/pg/House-museum-of-Nobel-brothers-in-Baku-Villa-Petrolea--150987831612836/about/?ref=page
Current local date and time now
Saturday, May 11, 2024, 19:19
User Ratings
4.5 based on (31 reviews)
Reviews
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5Nuriyevs 5:00 PM Jul 15, 2019
Historical place
This historical place was once home to the Noble family. It gives you an insight into the life of an oil barons family and some of the oil history of Azerbaijan.
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4johnhhaskell 5:00 PM Apr 13, 2019
Call first, keep your fingers crossed
I visited Baku in April 2019 as part of an investor conference. 15 of the attendees were interested in seeing the Nobel House during a break in the conference. Of course the museum website and TripAdvisor both said that the museum was open, but just to be sure we had the concierge at the Four Seasons call too; he reported that someone answered the phone and the museum was open. All 15 of us loaded into 3 different Baku city taxis and headed off. The museum is about 6km from the center of town and is indeed surrounded by a construction site - a new housing development named "White City" because the area previously had been so polluted by oil spills that it was named "Black City." We pull up to the front door and it's locked tight. With 15 people plus three drivers we decided we had the advantage of numbers and started banging on every door we could find. After about ten minutes some sort of builder came out of the side door and told us to wait 15 minutes. Remarkably, 15 minutes later a guide drove up and opened the house up for us. I asked the guide (I believe his name was Namyk) if he could guide us in English, he said no, so I offered him a choice of Turkish or Russian and interestingly he unhesitatingly chose Russian, so I became the translator for the group. Namyk is a good guide, he gave us a lot of detail, not only about the house when the Nobels owned it but also its 20th-21st Century operation, including how it was cleaned up and renovated. Notably, it was the site of the 1994 signing of the "Deal of the Century" for the exploitation of Azerbaijan's first offshore field. The house is beautiful and represents a very important part of world economic history. I would definitely recommend it for anyone who is interested in the history of the oil business or that of the Nobel family. As for it being "a waste of money," this is absurd as admission is 5 manat ($3) and we paid each taxi driver 35 manat ($20 per 5 people) for a round-trip drive and to wait for us while we did the tour. Just call ahead!
