Sovabazar & Shyambazar

Sovabazar takes its name from Shobharam Basak, an 18th-century merchant whose garden-turned-market gave the area its name; neighbouring Shyambazar was named for the Basak family deity, Shyam Rai. The market itself is an everyday food bazaar with no particular beauty, but the surrounding streets tell a different story. This was the neighbourhood of the great Bengali zamindars, the merchant-landlords who served as middlemen between the East India Company and the interior of Bengal, and the mansions they built between the mid-18th and 19th centuries constitute one of the most remarkable collections of domestic heritage architecture in Asia.
These mansions, called rajbaris (“royal houses”) or thakurbaris, followed a consistent typology: a formal outer courtyard (nat mandir) for ceremonies and performances, a colonnaded inner courtyard (thakur dalan) for the family deity and a private zenana (women’s quarter) beyond. The architecture combines Corinthian columns, Venetian shutters, Rajasthani jalis (lattice screens), terracotta friezes of Hindu mythology and Italian marble floors, an effect that should be discordant but is instead exhilarating.
Most mansions remain private residences, not formally open to the public, but Kolkata operates on a principle of porous hospitality a polite traveller can exploit. Approach the outer gate, introduce yourself and express genuine interest, and you’ll often be invited into the outer courtyard, with the inner sanctum offered at the family’s discretion. 
The Pathuriaghata subdistrict (off Rabindra Sarani, the old Chitpur Road) is especially dense with surviving mansions and easier to navigate than the deeper lanes. Its families include a separate branch of the Tagores descended from Darpanarayan Tagore, who split from the Jorasanko line after an 18th-century property dispute, alongside the Mullick family and several great Durga Puja patron clans.