Archinect - News

YAP Istanbul Modern Finalist Entry by ONZ Architects

2013-02-19T15:34:00-05:00

Earlier this month, the installation Sky Spotting Stop had been chosen as the first-ever YAP Istanbul Modern winner in conjunction with the Young Architects Programs at MoMA PS1 in New York, MAXXI in Rome and the cultural organization CONSTRUCTO in Santiago, Chile. Here is now also one of the five YAP Istanbul Modern finalist entries: Tearing the Ground by young Ankara-based firm, ONZ Architects.

SO? Architecture and Ideas wins first-ever YAP Istanbul Modern

2013-02-06T16:35:00-05:00

With the winners of the New York and Rome editions of the Young Architects Program (YAP) already unveiled, the first-ever YAP Istanbul Modern winner has now also been selected: the temporary installation Sky Spotting Stop by young design firm SO? Architecture and Ideas reached the highest score with the jury and will be built in early June in Istanbul Modern’s courtyard.

Soundtrack of a city: Baba Zula "Gecekondu"

2012-12-11T11:20:00-05:00

"The new album narrates urban life. It is rather personal music, bound up with this city, there are images of an asphalt jungle and a house that is being built in a city, and we always support the ones who don't have power." -Baba Zula

The new Baba Zula album is called "Gecekondu," a term used in Turkey for illegal settlements built on the fringes of major cities like Istanbul or Ankara. These growing slums, built with the simplest materials, have become home to many newcomers trying their luck in urban centers.

One could argue, though, that there's more dignity and beauty in the gecekondus than in the ritzy financial districts now conquering the legendary inner city areas of Istanbul. One example is a historic district situated in the shadows of the Byzantine city wall, known as Sulukule, which has been almost completely torn down.

The band opposes the gentrification of Istanbul.

Dror's Vision for HavvAda

2012-09-28T13:00:00-04:00

New York firm Dror today unveiled designs for a collosal artificial island to be created right off the coast of Turkey, not far from Istanbul. The project, dubbed HavvAda, is envisioned to rise from the sea by piling up one billion cubic meter of soil carved out of the main land from the construction of the proposed Canal Istanbul, another ambitious mega project currently proposed to run parallel to the Bosporus. Inspired by Buckminster Fuller, six gigantic geodesic domes will lift up artificial hills on the island which will be covered with residences and commercial buildings for a population of several hundred thousand people.

Find a detailed project description and images courtesy of Dror below.

A century after the Republic of Turkey was proclaimed; Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan presents the Canal Istanbul project and offers to re-visit the map of the city. One billion cubic meter of soil may be carved out of the main land in order to create the canal. Turkish deve...

Turkey’s Towering Ambition

2012-09-17T18:07:00-04:00

The larger irony is that in calling for a huge new mosque in the tradition of Sinan, Erdoğan may be missing the more fundamental lesson of the Ottoman architect’s work. As Bruno Taut, the German architect who emigrated to Turkey to flee the Nazis, argued, Sinan was himself a proto-modernist whose ability to create extraordinary beauty from novel engineering had more in common with twentieth-century German functionalism than earlier Islamic architecture.

In a politically analytical article in New York Review of Books, Hugh Eakin examines the power policies of Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan and his ambitious plan to crystallize the country's image and political agenda via a single building. A large new mosque in classical Ottoman style is planned to crown Istanbul's highest hill. A new mosque that nobody visiting Istanbul will be able to not see. As if the city with many masterpieces of religious buildings yet need another post modern one to refresh Erdogan's political and moral legacy via architecture.

There was an unofficial competition in Turkey with architects and others expressed the absurdity of the plans.

Three Entries Share First Prize in Istanbul’s Yenikapı Design Competition

2012-04-13T17:50:00-04:00

In the international design competition for Yenikapı Transfer Point and Archaeo-Park Area in Istanbul, Turkey, three First Prizes have been announced this week. The jury selected the top project teams Eisenmann Architects/Aytaç Architects, Atelye 70/Francesco Cellini/Insula Architettura E Ingegneria, and Cafer Bozkurt Architects/Mecanoo Architects from nine shortlisted teams, including MVRDV and other international firms.

"ISTANBUL FADING"

2012-01-22T16:27:00-05:00

Even though Özcan’s photographs do not contain a single human figure, we cannot talk about the absence of the subject. All these images are stamped by the shadow of the subject who has temporarily or permanently left. -Özgür Özakın

Photographer Metehan Özcan captures the fading feeling of the city from his highly poetic viewfinder. Photographer's other work and articles about them can be seen in his website.

metehanozcan.com

New Tower to Dwarf Istanbul’s Minarets

2012-01-12T12:01:00-05:00

Istanbul’s evocative skyline is set to be capped by a new peak, as architects on Wednesday unveiled plans to build a tower almost 300 meters high, which will rival the highest buildings in Europe. Scotland-based architectural firm RMJM’s office in Dubai said that it received planning approval for “Metropol Istanbul,” a vast 500,000 square meter project, which includes three towers, a 30,000 square meter public shopping mall, offices and luxury apartments.

History in the making: How Constantinople was built for Assassin's Creed

2011-11-18T13:59:35-05:00

Games gurus and architects have much in common: both design the movement of people through space. Assassin's Creed: Revelations, set in 16th-century Constantinople, writes that similarity large. To furnish the video-game's levels with verisimilitude, art director Raphael Lacoste and mission design director Falko Poiker turned draftsmen. They made a research trip to the city (today's Istanbul) to collect images that could be turned into computer graphics.

Turkey: Diverse Istanbul Neighborhood Faces Last Days

2011-07-29T22:16:59-04:00

Architects in 2009 described Istanbul’s downtown neighborhood of Tarlabaşı as an unsafe place for children -- a district whose destruction and reconstruction would be in the interest of its residents. Few dispute that Tarlabaşı is run-down and that many of its residents live below the poverty line. But the congested neighborhood is also one of the few remaining places in the city center where there is affordable housing for the urban poor.

Panorama / Istanbul

2011-07-23T14:42:02-04:00

Panaroma is a public art which criticize the lack of public space and the confused function of the few open/green spaces in İstanbul. Art Project by Andreas Fogarasi. Project architect & construction supervision by Alper Derinboğaz.

The installation is planned to move inside Istanbul every 3 months as follows: Kadıköy, Beşiktaş, Levent, Eminönü. Therefore the structure needed to be built in manner to be easily transportable as it was going to visit important public spaces in Istanbul. In order for it to be portable and to give it an “architectural luna park” quality Panorama was designed to include smaller parts that could be assembled at will. The contrast between the mobile steel construction and architectural elements like the marble casings and marble steps emphasized the main idea of the work. The white circle that hangs there in an “illogical” way presents an attractive element that invites the viewer to the platform. To be left alone with this white circle creates a contradictory state in the backdrop of the beautiful panorama of the Moda coast.

Panorama may not be functional or easily legible but it presents a happy surprise for those who will come across it. The confusion about its functionality en...