Improving the formal potential of high-rise buildings by artificial intelligence in the context of city image: the case of diyarbakir

Cities, which have been exposed to changes and transformations throughout history, can be described as living organisms. From this perspective, the dynamic character of cities has gained great momentum, especially with the globalization process. The traditional fabric of cities has started to change and cities have become the epicenter of the world economy. Accordinly the concept of global identity has come to prominence instead of the concept of local identity, which enables the differentiation and diversification of cities. Cities that have changed their image with globalization have started to create a modern city image in order to raise their profile in the global context. High-rise buildings, which are the reflection of this situation in urban space, are among the most stood-out elements of the city image. In various cities, high-rise buildings have come to the forefront by differentiating from the urban fabric and have become significant global identity elements of the city. High-rise buildings can be designed for different types of use. The functions of these buildings give shape to their form. High-rise buildings draw attention with their mass forms and take place in the collective memory. Thus, the formal and functional characteristics of the buildings drastically affect the city silhouette. The ability to produce building forms that have different forms and offer different spatial experiences and are in accordance with the urban context can be considered as an substantial parameter in high-rise building design. However, high-rise buildings in cities where the global city image is tried to be created have become commonplace by using similar forms or materials; they are designed as monoblock, without substractions, masses or glass rectangles. This sameness in cities has negatively affected the imaginability of cities and has been the argument of discussions as it damages the unprecedented urban identity and belongingness. In accordance with the reasons laid out for the concepts of high-rise building, interventions to architectural form and urban image were deemed worthy of being researched. These concepts were established to be independently addressed in the literature review. Taking into consideration that the mentioned concepts should be synchronized, the relevant gap in the literature has been tried to be eliminated. The originality of the research is due to the case that it is the first master's thesis to examine the concepts in question by handling them collectively. Within the objectives of the thesis, the form of high-rise buildings that attract attention in terms of urban planning in the context of city image is analyzed to determine the current situation of them. The form's mass potential is then developed by utilizing artificial intelligence, which has gained popularity recently. The intended development is served by the intersection of climatic and sociocultural parameters. The city of Diyarbakır has recently been involved in getting high-rise building trend. Within this context, the efficiency of artificial intelligence in the production of alternative urban images has been questioned in the city center of Diyarbakır. The case study is limited to Elazığ Boulevards, one of the most important road axes of the city. In order to break the chain of formal sameness of high-rise buildings, these buildings were divided into parametric and non-parametric periods for form analysis. Modern, postmodern and parametric designs are discussed by creating sub-categories. The interventions made to the architectural form of the examined examples were analyzed by using qualitative observation technique through matrices. The theorical framework was determined with the conceptual keyword pool created. The approaches embraced by city administrations are operative in the formation and continuation of urban identity. Municipalities are among the local government structures that represent the local people and are authorized in local urban planning. Accordingly, it is key to heighten awareness of the need to adopt holistic practices in urban design instead of fragmentary practices that overturn urban balances in getting high-rise buildings. Therefore, interviews were held with Yenişehir Municipalitiy on which the study area is dependent. As a result of these interviews, a mixed-use high-rise building model that takes into account the urban context for the determined area and includes living spaces day and night to warrant the safety and security of the area was proposed. Besides, this model aims to strengthen the connection of high-rise building designs in Diyarbakır with the local context and make them globally competitive. Therefore, it is designed to be co-dominant in terms of both form-function relationship and form-context relationship. The proposed model was turned into alternative outputs with the artificial intelligence powered design tool "Fabrie Ai" in line with information obtained from the prepared matrix and conceptul keyword pool. The tool was chosen because of it's easy-to-use interface and the pilot applications obtained satisfactory results compared to similar tools. In order to interpret the impact of architecture on people and cities, a survey was conducted to academicians specialized in architecture. In this respect, supporting the research with quantitative observation technique increases the reliability and originality. To sum up, it has been established that the design of alternative outputs powered by artificial intelligence in the pre-application stage has an considerable role in breaking the vicious circle experienced in the form production process of architectural practice, and it has been turned out that this perspective should be included in the design processes. Besides, it is thought that future works can address the effectiveness of artificial intelligence in generating distinctive alternatives for different building types. Within this context, the study serves as a resource for researches to come.