Built on many layers of past empires and having shed glorious names like Byzantium, Constantinople and Stambuli, Istanbul is a much contested territory at the moment by foreign and domestic investors and by the international architects playing the we-know-how card.

The city's regain of rock star status is on the charts everywhere. The original junction of the civilizations still performs that great act.

Istanbul's architectural pedigree is impressive, you can study centuries old masterpieces still in use, have a cup of tea in the same coffee house where Corbu drew sketches for his Journey to the East and trace hillside homes by Bruno Taut, Ernst Egli and others. There are many Turkish modern buildings from the Republic's early years after the tired Ottoman Empire. Those were the days, the second quarter of twentieth century, when the idealist young architects of Turkey produced works worthy of their modernist mentors' praises and confident of their own identity.

Then, something drastic happened in 60's. Coupled or tripled with political unrest, democratic regression, economy without ethics, cities and buildings without architects became the norm.

Architects and planners simply did not disappear; they have just become puppets in the hands of speculative builders who did not know what a plan meant and why there should be architects designing buildings. These instant entrepreneurs caused a lot of damage that most Turkish cities will never recover from.

Although, with its largely infected fabric, Istanbul is not beyond the reach of urban solutions within its physically and economically dilapidated sections, and against its dubious land transactions.

These days, many foreign architects are visiting the city, giving lectures and offering solutions. Bold plans pitched to the mayors and high-level politicians, distant friendships made and large districts of the city are eyed, often in the name of unfair gentrification schemes called, 'Urban Transformation Projects.'

Market researchers and PR people from the Gulf Region, Western Europe and United States based large firms are busy to get contracts signed for their developer clients. Their architects are also busy finding local offices to carry on their projects designed in their home offices elsewhere. They want a building in this highly symbolic place that spans between the continents and joins them via the monumental handshake of two Istanbuls, one from the East and one from the West. Civilizations will have to brace each other over Bosporus before they fly off to Baku, Almaty and thereoff to build the future cities.

In Istanbul, the task is mainly a repair job, but a very delicate one.

Lesser known to most outsiders, this fascinating metropolis is also a place of beehive like activity for the domestic talent. A place for a young group of Turkish architects who are mainly surviving through national competitions, designing for emerging new communities, businesses and institutions. They want to shake things up, establish their territory, build various scale buildings compatable with their foreign counterparts, and perhaps start to export their talents in all directions from their strategic location.

This article started out as a rather personal research to find out what was going on in Turkey via Istanbul and its architects point of view. I was trying to get a certain cross section of younger generation of Turkish architects, who were mostly educated in Turkey and ask them about their work, challenges and daily grunge. It quickly developed into a multiple long distance short interviews with the help of Emine Merdim-Yılmaz, editor in chief of Arkitera, I was able to construct my own very first 'five architects' curatorial article, to say the least...

Some readers will be surprised with the familiarity of the issues these architects are dealing with, and if you are slightly familiar with the chaotic context where they are executing their work, you would appreciate their resilience, quest for quality and fighting spirit.

The unchecked obtuse growth, many irreversible urban design and architectural blunders committed on daily basis in their vicinity, these Young Turks have to wear their battle gears on all phases of their work and year around with no rest on sight...

They are political, active, business savvy, determined and restless. We have few things to learn from them.

I asked similar and sometimes the same questions to the architects, and when I understood the context of their practice better, the preciousness of their work became all the more apparent.

They say, as an architect you'll get better as you get older, but you will be doing your most important and difficult work during the youth of your professional life.

- Orhan Ayyüce, Senior Editor, Archinect

With special thanks to Emine Merdim-Yılmaz, Editor in Chief, Arkitera, all the architects and their staff who participated in these interviews.

DB ARCHITECTURE
Bünyamin Derman / Dilek Topuz Derman
www.dbmimarlik.com.tr


Bünyamin Derman, photo courtesy of Arkitera

Orhan Ayyüce- How do you describe your involvement with architectural competitions and your way of winning them. What it takes to win a competition?

Bünyamin Derman/Dilek Topuz Derman- Competition is a widely used tool for acquiring new business all over the world. It is the key to both improve and create awareness of oneself as a young architect. From this perspective, it is surely not a coincidence that our career started with competitions. National and international competitions serve as platforms to compete with highly experienced architects. Everybody competes to win of course but there is no clear-cut formula for it. If you had done your homework, have an original idea and have expressed yourself articulately, then an experienced selection committee would not be indifferent to your work. And, the journey is as important as the destination you arrive at in the end.

OA- How do you feel about doing highly complex and large project like airports early in your carrier?

BD/DTD- Dalaman Airport is special both as a project and as a practice without a doubt. This project is a milestone of our career in terms of organization, coordination, fieldwork, and client relationships. And, the high standards we have achieved with it are to last. We can clearly express with contentment that we continue to make large scale projects with great quality.


Dalaman Airport, Bünyamin Derman with Emre Arolat Architects


Dalaman Airport, Bünyamin Derman with Emre Arolat Architects

OA- How do you describe the transformation of the architectural scene in Turkey?

BD/DTD- With the globalization of markets, Turkey has become an attractive market for investors. Although this mobility seems attractive because of the variety and number of projects, competition metrics have changed. Foreign investors are bringing banks, supply chains, and architects with them. This, by weakening the competitive position of the local firms, has forced them to re-organize to do business with global standards. In other words, if you want to exist and manifest yourself with quality work, you'd better be good at what you do. And, that is what we are trying to do.


Dalaman Airport, Bünyamin Derman with Emre Arolat Architects

OA- Do you actively seek work abroad?

BD/DTD- Naturally, we do not border ourselves with national projects. Our international presence best manifests itself with the awards we have got for several international competitions we had attended. In addition to that we have international proposals, projects and consultancy work we are executing for the time being.


Antalya Film Museum, DB ARCHITECTURE

TEĞET ARCHITECTURE
Mehmet Kütükçüoğlu / Ertuğ Uçar
www.teget.com


Mehmet Kütükçüoğlu / Ertuğ Uçar

Orhan Ayyüce- Where do you see your firm in coming years?

Ertuğ Uçar- We want to be a firm synonymous with quality and contributions to architectural work, instead of a firm synonymous with total square footage built. As echoed in our web site, we want to be collaborative, open to criticism and we want to seek that critical environment around us. Also, we would like to remain above the trends and instead of form and materiality plays, we want to produce timeless line of work with plan based solutions incorporating interiors and exteriors.


Baro of Istanbul, TEĞET Architecture


Baro of Istanbul TEĞET Architecture


Baro of Istanbul TEĞET Architecture

OA- How do you define your role in the transformation of the architectural scene in Turkey?

EU- In the urbanized areas of Turkey architects don't play a major role in the building process. There is hardly a culture of architecture exists. There are no standards for doing architecture. For example; client architect relations are usually very amateurish, the fees established by the architects' guild are very low to develop a decent project, usually architect's job is considered done upon the delivery of construction drawings and there is a disdain for architects who are doing construction administration, it is viewed as unnecessary, etc...

So, in this case, the architect is usually asked to do a lot of sacrifices for the love of the profession. Other words, conditions are not healthy. Many problems coming up during the development and construction phase are ending up unresolved. This is naturally leading to badly finished product. You have to be resilient to work under these circumstances and in order to establish some standards, you have to stand tall at all times.

OA- What are the most specific challenging situations you are currently dealing with, in regards to practicing architecture in Turkey?

EU- First, most common problem we are running into is to be a part of construction process. We have to work hard to convince the client that we should be a part of the construction process. Even the Maritime Museum project which we have won through a competition and worked two years to develop, we made a huge effort to stay on the board for the construction administration and we had to talk many bureaucrats from bottom up. It is still not clear we are going be the project administrators as architects.


Maritime Museum, TEĞET Architecture


Maritime Museum, TEĞET Architecture


Maritime Museum, section, TEĞET Architecture

Second, it is very hard to make specialized areas like landscape, lighting, fire and emergency systems designs part of the project and establish budgets for the consultants. You can imagine the lack of completeness without these consultants. However we don't particularly have difficulties with the design process. Since our clients coming to us after seeing our previous projects, outside of the programming and technical issues we don't have too much interruption during the design process.

OA- How do you compare architectural education abroad and in Turkey?

EU- I have not studied abroad. I am teaching design studios in Istanbul Technical University and Yildiz Technical University and invited to juries in other schools. Sometimes I see the work of foreign students. There is a difference but since the students are the same, I am thinking the difference is coming from the instructors. Other-words, the fabric is the same, but there is a problem with the tailor... However, I cannot really say too much without seeing more student environments abroad.


Belek Homes, Belek, Turkey, TEĞET Architecture

TECE ARCHITECTURE
Tülin Hadi / Cem İlhan
www.tecemimarlik.com

Orhan Ayyüce- You have won a competition to build a stadium in a suburb of Izmir, but after the competition the project was put on hold. I am from Izmir and when I saw your small stadium in the newspapers, I was excited. Is there any hope or progress toward building the Yeşilyurt stadium?

Tülin Hadi/Cem İlhan- Yeşilyurt Stadium was a powerful example of our concept and design strategy in resolving the urban and building scale problem. It has received the praises of architectural community and the selection jury.

However, unfortunately, there is no hope that it will become a reality. The local mayor who was a jury member as well, turned around and wanted to build a small sports arena on the same lot instead. Our efforts to convince him did not result in anything. Since it was a competition outside the jurisdiction of the Architects Guild, they could not force it either. It will now remain as an example in the literature of small sports complex designs...


Yeşilyurt Sports Complex, TECE Architecture


Yeşilyurt Sports Complex, TECE Architecture

OA- How do you improve and maintain your practice?

TH/Cİ- We started with competitions. We have just completed our 15th. year as a firm and even though they are few, we have almost never got any project outside of the competitions. Most of our team of architects are here because we do mainly competitions. We believe in doing competitions, solving and engaging in different problems and challenging ourselves. However, we are now more selective of competitions because increasingly juries are selecting images instead of solutions.

For our visibility, we don't use anything other than our website and publications. We don't have a marketing department. We get a lot of support from architectural community and from our colleagues. If possible, we don't want to exceed our eight people team and still remain competitive through our collaborators and consultants. Clearly though, we need to expand outside of the architectural community.


Siemens Employees Social Center, TECE Architecture

OA- How do you describe the transformation of the architectural scene in Turkey?

TH/Cİ- It is necessary to think architectural work together with, employers/clients, architects, building sector. And, the market is increasingly accepting design work and ideas as a commodity it needs to pay for. Even though it still needs to improve, this is the time the employers/clients are paying more attention to architecture. It is also a good time for architects who are having more choices than ever in terms of available materials and construction technology. Design, build and administer triangle is having a better reception. Furthermore, they are slowly becoming the standard procedure. The firms who are understanding and defining the programmatic needs, following consistent and healthy time schedules, taking their imaginative work closest to reality and crowning these virtues with international success are giving a lot of encouragement to the other firms. Turkish firms are increasingly getting confident in their work.

Presently, architects in Turkey are in a very busy and consistent work tempo. Many Turkish firms are working on creative projects both here and abroad. They are also acting as local project architects for big foreign offices. Even though it does not sound good to be somebody's project architect, the experience gained from such projects are proving to be very important in terms of establishing production, time scheduling and budgetary standards used in global practices.

In this time period, even the small firms are adopting in house hierarchies, organizational charts, production standards and professional work habits. The firms who have adopted these methods recorded growth. The problems of rapid development and growth have been countered with youthful energy, adaptability and the collaborative effort among the younger firms. However the fruits of these gains are also depend on the sustainability of these practices and the flow of the incoming projects. Most firms' exported work is directed toward Russia and Caspian Sea region. The Western influenced work of Turkish firms have not produced substantial work for these places in terms of cultural and geographical similarities. In fact, if you think in terms of Dubai, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, the clients are not interested in cultural similarities anyway.

In the latest period, the largest sector in Turkish construction industry were the shopping malls and the housing or the combination of the two. With the exception of few projects like Santral Istanbul and Sabanci Museum , there has not been a lot of public projects in Turkey. One would think there would be many competitions for public projects because of Istanbul becoming the cultural capitol of Europe for a year or so in 2012., but so far there is not much activity. The city of Pecs in Hungary is already have projects underway for the same event and we feel left behind already. But we should not be hopeless considering the political turmoil we are experiencing at the moment.

ERGINOĞLU / ÇALISLAR ARCHITECTURE
Kerem Erginoğlu / Hasan Çalışlar
www.ecarch.com

Orhan Ayyüce- How do you define the existence of globally informed clientele in Turkey?

Kerem Erginoğlu/ Hasan Çalışlar- Clients often come to us with images or a trend in mind for a given project. While they may be aware of what is happening architecturally/ design-wise globally, unfortunately the time constraints are such that the design process is generally quite short.




Burc Beach, Erginoğlu/Çalışlar Architecture

OA- How do you see the transformation of Turkish cities taking a place?

KE/HÇ- Much to the demise of our cities, architects are generally not afforded the opportunity to be an active part of this process. City planning & design projects are generated and decided upon by city council bureaucrats- not architects. Resultantly, this transformation is taking place with minimal input from specialists/ professionals and without the needed groundwork necessary to deliver desirable outcomes.




New Istanbul, Erginoğlu/Çalışlar Architecture

OA- What are the most challenging situations you are currently dealing with, in regards to practicing architecture in Turkey?

KE/HÇ- The Turkish development laws, and the lack of an industry-wide Code of Building Regulations, including standards and specifications.


Mixed Use Center, Baku, Azerbaijan, Erginoğlu/Çalışlar Architecture

ÇIRAKOĞLU ARCHITECTURE LTD.
Alişan Çırakoğlu
http://www.cirakoglu.com/


Alişan Çırakoğlu and Co.

Orhan Ayyüce- ODTÜ Teknokent is an important and ambitious building. Do you see it influencing your future work?

Alişan Çırakoğlu- ODTÜ (METU) Teknokent Galyum Blok project was a particularly significant case for my architectural practice. First of all the building would somehow be a part of METU (Middle East Technical University) campus where I studied architecture, and the physical environment of the campus and especially the faculty of architecture building itself had been shaped as a result of an ambitious design approach. I believe having the opportunity to design a building in such an environment encouraged me to stay further away from certain market-dictated-stylistic-clichés of building production process than I can manage to in our other works. Our client was the university and the contractor was also a company which belongs to METU Development Foundation. This obviously led to a totally different architect client relationship than we got used to in typical commercial commissions. The whole design and construction process of Galyum Blok presented us a projection of how a building erection may take place in terms of collaboration with professionals for our future works.


ODTÜ Teknokent, ÇIRAKOĞLU Architecture


ODTÜ Teknokent, ÇIRAKOĞLU Architecture

OA- How do you maintain a collaborative practice?

AÇ- The building industry or in more general terms, the formation of the urban environment now involves more individuals from many number of disciplines. We are aware that being corporate makes life easier for all parties of the industry, such as service providers like us or the actual builders. But we are also aware that such an ease may take us to a boredom and make us lose the "architectural essence" we are trying to keep in all of our production of any scale. Rather than positioning the persona of the architect at the top of a hierarchical order we are trying to keep "architecture" at the core of building production process. We are getting organized as a team in this manner.

OA- How do you describe the transformation of the architectural scene in Turkey?

AÇ- Unfortunately construction work is everybody's business in Turkey and as a result the hardest part of running an architectural practice is convincing the potential client to invest in the "architectural project" instead of paying for architectural drawings.

OA- Do you actively seek work abroad?

AÇ- We were having contacts with firms abroad for architectural projects, especially from Kazakhstan but up to now none of them went further than preliminary conceptual studies. I actually do not seek work abroad at the moment not because we do not want to do work out there but I do not have any idea about how to contact companies especially in Europe and United States.


ODTÜ Teknokent, entrance. Photo, Arkitera, ÇIRAKOĞLU Architecture