Factors that affect the architectural design of apartment building dwellings and the process of production: Example of Gebze and Cayirova

One can say that architects play an effective role in the process of dwelling production. The role of architects varies depending on many factors such as the environment, customer requests and funds. Luxurious and higher-quality dwellings with brand value are designed in areas with higher levels of income while the quality of buildings decreases where the level of income is lower. Architectural design is never independent from economic, social and cultural values. Economic, human, social and cultural structure affects the process of architectural design directly or indirectly. Professional position of architects is shaped within this network of relationships. Along with the rise of apartment buildings, the process of architectural design has come to involve the property owner, the contractor and the architect. The architect often ends up as a mediator between the demands of property owners and contractors, legal regulations, and his/her own professional experience and approach. In apartment design if there is a contractor, property owners rarely work with an architect directly so architects would mostly never know who would inhabit in products of their design. Generally there is no interaction and dialogue between user and architect in apartment design. Architects design with the knowlegde gathered from contractors or their education and professional experience which tend them to create a standartizied user profile whom they design for. The financial relation between property owner and the contractor, legal regulations and also open market conditions decrease the architects‟ decision maker position on architectural design. Architects have to work within long processes of procedures for acceptance of their architectural projects in several institutions, especially in municipalities. The limitations of legal regulations on architectural design varies from height, depth and shape of the building to detail as the height of the stair risers and height of the windows, doors, etc. which also cause architects to design in a limited context especially in the regions of low income. Architects are unable to decide the slope and shape of the roof or the measures of the rooms which are defined in regulations as others. Variety and constant changes of regulations make architects always follow the changes and is a major reason of time waste and is a barrier on personal and professional development. Architectural design mostly takes place only between contractors and architects and design turns in to a singular way instead of plurality as participatory design. The products of architectural designs, buildings look similar due to the same demands and approximately the same financial issues all the contractors in the region have. The contractors aim is to sell the flats or houses they built as quick as possible to guarantee their investment and benefit. In this way of thinking, anything saleable is a fine architectural design. Details and facade designs is not seen in projects and that lessen the quality of the project. Architects have to be draw fast and building licence have to be taken from the municipalities as soon as possible. Architects professional experience and talent is less important because the buildings look the same and it is no more important who design due to same reasons as regulations, financial issues. Architects who graduated from university and have no professional experience or the architects who have not feel free in terms of economical issues would probably design totally according to contractors‟ demands not to lose the employer. One of the major problem for architects is that architectural projects is not only drawn by architects. Only architects have the authority of signing the architectural projects but practically engineers and technicians also draw and that causes the others to behave or known as architects especially in the places of lower income. That way of production causes to lessen the costs of the projects but in certain also diminish the quality. The minimum architectural project fees is defined by the Union of Chambers of Turkish Engineers and Architects (TMMOB) in Turkey but most architects‟ project fee is lower than that degree. Avoiding the loss and to provide equality in terms of competitiveness architectural fees are needed to be standardizied in legal ragulations and must be inspected routinely. This study examines the processes of architectural design and dwelling production for medium or low-income groups as well as the factors affecting these processes. The process of construction of apartment buildings, dwelling demand and supply, and urbanization process in Turkey is explored in discussing the decision-making role of legal regulations, demands of contractors-property owners and the architect in architectural design within the context of architectural design process in Turkey. Architectural design process is evaluated in two stages, i.e. outcome-oriented and process-oriented. For the purpose of examining architectural design as a process, structured open-ended interviews were conducted with five architects, two civil engineers and one construction teacher, who currently produce architectural projects in private practice. For the purpose of examining architectural design from an outcome-oriented point of view, content analysis is conducted for a total of 30 units randomly selected from 21 single-block apartment building projects of the aforementioned persons which are completed or still under construction, and these analyses are evaluated together with the interview findings. Interviews provide for the qualitative data while the content analysis provides for the quantitative data. Content analysis evaluates the building, floor and apartment qualifications of the projects as well as the number, variety and space of the places. The scope of the study is limited with the rapidly industrializing and urbanizing districts of Gebze and Cayirova of the province of Kocaeli.