Re-evaluation of the modern building stock: Istanbul, Tozkoparan

The intensification of the massive housing production, in the second half of the 20th century and the relation of this housing model to modern architecture is the main question of this research. Throughout this period (and until very recent), the production of physical environment and consequently suburbanization have been criticized harshly from within and outside of the disciplines of planning and architecture. Accompanying the discussions, many projects have been and are being proposed in order to improve, regenerate or demolish and replace the existing neighbourhoods. Within this work, Tozkoparan Neighbourhood, a housing project realized in the late 1960's and early 1970's in Istanbul has been designated as the case study, with an aim of representing the connection of above-mentioned discussions to the local, geographical, social and cultural context of Istanbul, Turkey. The project accommodates many characteristics of post-war modernism as widely acknowledged in architecture and planning disciplines. As a social housing project, that was a part of the larger "Squatter Prevention" Project, Tozkoparan is an important source of information, related to the social and spatial transformations occurred on a larger scale. This research, proposing to conceive new knowledge by understanding the layers added by usage, embodies the investigation of the case study and the representation of the findings in two different methodological approach: the documentation of physical appropriations and in-depth interviews by the inhabitants. These two in-situ data collection and representation techniques allowed the research to focus on a less romanticized approach on a problematic area and its changing meanings within the context of a changing, globalizing city. The literature review on the housing discussions gathered around the architecture and modernity topics revealed four outstanding concepts: civic space, discrediting, nostalgia and intervention. Another research axis was oriented towards understanding the local context. Field studies included the documentation of the existing physical space and in-depth interviews with the inhabitants. The aim of documentation has been locating the building in the local history of architecture and conceive new knowledge from the appropriation of space by the inhabitants. The interviews enabled the researcher to superpose the stories with space and correlate the conceptual outcome and the changing needs of the users. As a consequence, the analysis has been a tool to understand the layers of usage without romanticization or mystification. The outcomes of this historiographic investigation are manifesting a plausible positioning of this unique example in the knowledge of architecture. The original contribution of this narrative, constructed in this research, to the field of urban studies and architecture is primarily the documentation and description of a unique example. In addition to that it brings the neglected potentials of similar examples in a wider geography and their possible contribution to the disciplines dealing with urban space, into question.