Firm： EAA – Emre Arolat Architecture

Type： Commercial › Office

STATUS： Built

YEAR： 2014

The project for the office building to be situated on the Mecidiyekoy-Maslak axis, where Turkey’s foreign capital takes its most visible form, was conditioned by the tension between density of its environ and the tightness of the project site. It was the client’s wish that the building would be a prestigious building, just like all the other surrounding buildings which only meant to be prominent, having been developed with no certain rule, plan or order.

Apart from the other projects along the Buyukdere Avenue, which is the main business district of Istanbul, Maslak No.1 Office Tower was designed to enrich the quality of the typical office space by vertical gardens. In order to accomplish that, a rational office block which was planned over a 8.25 x 8.25 m grid, enveloped with a free formed glazing system was designed. The envelope acting as a secondary facade in south and west direction is detached from the building up to 17 meters wide, let vertical gardens in 20 meters high. The space in-between two facades was considered as a buffer zone both for the acoustical and the climatic sense.

The curvilinear plan of the facade formed by the 150 x 200 cm rectangular modules was designed regarding the perception from the highway. The facade was considered as a silicon glazing system having a translucent film layer over it. The opacity of the film layer diverse, up to the orientation of the curvilinear facade; on southern facade a less transparent pattern was chosen; however in north, almost a transparent film was used.