Contributions of architecture to the corporate world in the context of globalization: Headquarters examples

Globalization represents a term that the boundaries between countries have been disappeared, the world has become only one place and the pieces have become stronger. It also represents a world that corporations have become international and their impacts have become more effective. In the process of globalization, individual and the needs become homogenized and stereotyped. Becoming different and going ahead in this globalizing competition is an important issue, for the user who is in the role of consumer, facts like the 'difference' and the 'power' have started being used. In the present day as a symbol of statue, being different and preferable is important and can be seen as the key of being powerful in a globalized world. In the fields like 'branding', 'brand identity' and 'corporate identity'; architecture and generally 'design' is as an important fragment as marketing, economics, finance, advertising, visual and graphic design. The relationship between the symbols which power brings into, - which is called a set of 'the corporate identity'- and the building and the interiors is the main vertebrae of the thesis. Actors of the globalized world need 'different' buildings in the competition they are; a building which tells much about the corporate identity, corporate aim and corporate frame; a building which is talked by people and the architecture professionals, a building which wins awards by the architecture it has, a building which completes the corporate strategy and the corporate package perfectly. In this study, there is a seeking attitude that fields like economics, finance, advertising, marketing and visual design; architecture is as an important component as well. In addition to being an important instrument while completing the whole corporate frame, architecture starts to have more mission in this corporate package; architectural offices have the profession of designing the 'corporate identity' besides 'corporate buildings' in several architectural offices worlwide and also in Turkey. Such architectural offices those design the corporate building and the visual identiy in one hand, have the chance to solve problems faster and manage the process as a complete project. The individuals have three dimensions while perceieving themselves; how they perceieve them, how they are perceieved by others and how they want the others to perceieve them. Corporations behave alike; how they see themselves, how they are perceieved by the others and how they want the world to perceieve them. For the corporate actors of the globalized world, it can be said that it is a corporate frame that the corporation tries to draw by using all the fields in a well designed corporate strategy. In a complete strategy of a corporate identity, corporations use disciplines like finance, marketing, visual design, architecture and advertising as a complete package. With all the instruments like architecture, visual design and advertising it uses, a corporate attitude aims to be known, be different and become a leader in the competition (which has too many similar actors in a globalized world with no boundary and too technologic to reach far away geographies) it takes place. Starting from this similarity, in the first chapter of the thesis, the change that globalization had triggered in individuals' lives and urban life is analyzed. Globalization have an affect on urban, achitectural and the individual scale. With the term of globalization, cities get closer, information reached each other faster and life started to be 'borderless' for the corporate actors in far away geographies and the people who live on them. In the architectural scale, the homogenization started and architecture has become a meta like a product in a shopping center. Globalization is a process that brings similarity and homogenisation with and with it, 'space' transforms into a buyable 'meta' and a trade object. In time following, the achitecture has found the solution in itself again, a seeking attitude for the homogenization started to appear as getting different, finding a way to being preferable. In the scale of the individual, a change of the mission from the 'producer' to 'consumer' instead has happened. By the individual's passing to the cathegory 'consumer' from the cathegory 'producer' the demand starts to differ. At this point, space is also perceieved as a statue symbol by the individuals and the seeking attitude in producing the space becomes getting different from the 'others', creating some different facilities for the users. At this point, architects and all kind of design professionals start to seek and design different facilities (luxurious, green, sky-high, strategically located or designed in a different form) for the user who already has the chance to have the average products but still seeks for the higher standards and facilities. In the present day, for representing the big power and prestige, 'building' is being used as an instrument, the actors of globalized world uses the architecture field as an instrument as well. At this point, the one who designs the building in the frame of corporate strategy has a change and more importance in the task definition. By this, it is observed that by this 'building' instrument the designer designs for the corporation, architects have a more dynamic position. Like architecture and the interior design of the corporate buildings, corporate identity design is an important fragment of a corporate strategy. Corporate design is the field of graphic designers and visual designers, but in addition to this nowadays, it can be served as a service in architectural offices and in the global world and also in Turkey it has already started to be a proffesional service as 'branding' and 'corporate identity design' departments in several architectural offices; in these kind of design attitude, the design of the space and the design of corporate identity is being created parallel and it makes the complete final work well-integrated. In the first chapter of the thesis specifications in a place (such as difference, statue seeking) is explored and in addition to individual's change, how the corporations start to exist in the competition is being searched in the context of corporation – corporate – corporate identity in the context of globalization. In the second chapter of the thesis, architect's new positions and potentials of architecture discipline are explored. Relatively to the second chapter, the star architect issue is mentioned; with the affect of no-boundary modern global landscape, architects also started to work in all other away geographies they even don't now much. At this point, a global language appears and as a way of making it work in different geographies, global solutions have some reference to the local traditions and usages (as a mixage term 'glocal') starts to appear. Some of these no-boundary designers have offices in other countries too and in time, these architects become famous with the language they use in every builging as 'a sign' and this sign is known all over the world. Star architects or in a popular attitude 'starchitects' is a new use of word is started being used with globalization and by the end of the 20th century and by the start of 21st century. These kind of well-known architects and architectural design groups are being prefered by global corporations for having more 'prestige' all over the world by the architectural language and the awards they win with the architecture of their brand new headquarter buildings. In the third chapter of the thesis, as strong examples of the corporate buidings, seven headquarters project from the world scale and from Turkey has been picked analyzed. For understanding the corporate frame, the headquarters projects analyzed with their corporate informations. The façade, materials used, forms, the fragments of interior design and the visual design used inside are used while understanding the relationship between their corporate strategy and the architectural design. At the end of the analyzing, the substractions are being filtered in the headlines which is picked to understand the relationship between the architecture and the contributions of the field of achitecture to the corporate identity. In the last chapter, deductions from the thesis study has being published. Starting from the globalization - architecture axis, the relationship between corporate actors of the globalized world and the architectural fields has being ordered. By using the analyzes, the thesis study aims to understand the relationship between corporate identity strategies and the building / headquarter / architecture side; headquarter buildings are being used to seek the corporate impact of the architecture because of being strong symbols of the corporate actors all over the world by different and famous designs they have. The selected examples are designed by architectural offices called 'starchitects' who are known by their design language all over the world, an architectural design solution of a collaboration by two global side: the corporate landscape side and the famous global starchitect office side. As a final speech, in the term that globalization changed the needs of an individual and corporate landscapes and has triggered a competition between corporations and in the term corporations have started using buildings as symbols of their power, this research which 'corporate' effect and 'corporate achitecture' is examined by the headquarter buildings as architectural productions of well-known corporations from Turkey and the world is being expected to be a layout for future subsequent works.