Global Flows, Istanbul and the Global Architecture in Istanbul

Abstract

Istanbul is a city clearly exposing the transformative effects of the flows of people, commodities, money and information. Throughout this process, the urban and architectural context of Istanbul has been changed and reproduced. Especially starting from 2000, since the flow of information and capital has accelerated globally and Istanbul is situated on the main route of that flow, significant changes have emerged in the physical, social and economic patterns of Istanbul. In this context, there have been primarily two means of change in the physical pattern of Istanbul. On the one hand, new functional areas that absorb the demand of global capital have emerged, while on the other, a new architectural language has appeared in terms of material and form. This paper aims to understand the general spatial characteristics of global cities under the said continuous flows. It focuses on the recently changed urban pattern and architectural language of Istanbul by providing the viewpoints of innovative architectural offices that closely follow the improvements in the world regarding global architectural language and computer-generated digital forms.