Ayman Farms • Templar stable and also the first Yikite patisserie in Carmel

(a story about a building) - In the Hezbollah missile attack on Haifa from November 16.11.24, 3, one of the buildings that was severely damaged was included in a complex that was once a Templar agricultural farm known as "Aiman ​​Farm", located at XNUMX Hzvi Blvd.

Carmelheim, the German Carmel

The ambition of the Templars, after establishing the colony below Carmel, was to settle on Mount Carmel itself. However, this ambition was opposed by the Carmelite monks who saw themselves as the "rulers of Carmel" and owners of many lands on the mountain. The situation changed towards the end of the 19th century, when Friedrich Keller, one of the leaders of the Templars, the butcher who was the vice-consul of Prussia in Northern Israel, managed to convince the Carmelites to sell land to the Templars (1887). And so in 1890 he even built his house on Keller Street today and his house was the first to be built in this area which was known by the Templar community as "Carmelheim", i.e. "the Carmel residence" or as it was also called "the German Carmel". Today this neighborhood is the heart of the "Center of Carmel". 
Later, more houses were built in Carmelheim, as well as hostels and a hotel, among them:
- Keller's hotel - Loftkurhaus - 3 Keller St 

• Pross's Hotel - Beit Hecht building today (1893)

• The Schneider Hotel (1911) was replaced by a commercial center and Panorama Towers

• Havat Ayman - a guest house that included several buildings - at 1-3 Zvi Blvd.

Ayman Farm

The building used today as a boutique hotel (3 Hazvi Ave.) is part of an agricultural complex that included a modest guest house and a residence, established in 1904 by Keller's friend, Christine Eyman (Christian Eimann) and his wife Victoria, members of the Templar community. The farm stretched between the streets Keller, Zvi, Riomonim and the cypresses of the day. The land was bought from Friedrich Keller, Prussian deputy consul in Haifa. The produce of the farm supplied the needs of the German hotels in Carmel. The building itself - 2 stories, built of stone - was alternately used as a stable, a warehouse and a residential apartment. As mentioned, the building that was severely damaged by the missile attack launched by Hezbollah also belongs to the former farm complex (1 Hzvi St.).

It should be noted that in the place of another building of the farm, the synagogue "Fathers and Sons" was built in the past, which luckily was not damaged in the same missile attack despite its proximity to the place of impact.

Klein pastry shop.

In 1930, the house that is now used as a hotel was rented by Yitzhak Klein From the hands of the Pankovitz family, who purchased, at some point, the farm buildings from "the company to open Palestinian lands Ltd." Ms. Klein arrived in Israel from Austria in 1930. Yitzhak Klein opened a cake bakery on the ground floor while the family lived on the first floor. It was the first cake bakery in Carmel and some say it was even the first in all of Haifa. mother of the family Ella Klein, was the pastry chef. The father of the family, Yitzhak Klein, would go down the donkey trail to Hadar with his produce and would sell his wares in front of Beit Kharun.

In 1933, the Klein family opened a cafe in the building that was in the grove in front of the then Pross Hotel (the Hecht Dahome Museum) which operated there until 1939. After that, the cafe moved to the building where the First International Bank branch is located (135 Moriah) and operated in that location until 1948.

Building preservation

The Ayman farm was declared a "building for preservation" by the Council for the Preservation of Heritage Sites in Israel and the Haifa Municipality. The building at 3 Hzvi Blvd. has undergone a conservation process and is currently home to a boutique hotel and spa. The roof of the building at 1 Zvi Blvd. was severely damaged by the Hezbollah missile attack. In the same attack, the "Beit Keller" building (2 Keller St.), which houses the "Schumacher Institute" and which we told about last week, was also hit by shrapnel.

Thanks

My thanks are hereby given thanks to Ms. A blunt statement, from the Haifa History Association, an expert on Haifa architecture and its architects, for her help in obtaining essential information for editing the article.

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