Located on the southwest coast of Turkey, Antalya was world's fourth most visited city in 2010. The city hosts an average of 10 million tourists per year.
"World botanic Expo 2016" is the first Expo in Turkey and will be held in Antalya with the theme of "flowers and children".
Expo tower structures have become the landmark of the citys' they are made in. Eiffel tower in Paris, the Atomium in Brussels and Ferris Wheel in Chicago are a few of them. Expo 2016 Antalya tower is an observatory tower which 250 people can visit at the same time and has a café for the visitors to enjoy.
The main concern in the tower design was to create a symbolic structure representing both the EXPO Theme and Antalya city in the same structure.
A triumphal arc, “Hadrian's gate” is the entrance of old town in Antalya. It has 3 arched gates. This historic gate has influence on the design of the Expo tower, as in the 3 terraces of the tower represents the 3 gates.
“The World Botanic Expo 2016” Antalya will embrace the world with the theme of "flowers and children" and the slogan "green planet for the future generations". At this point palm trees in Antalya has been an inspiration. The design of the tower originated from the branches embracing the sky which also reminds children opening arms in joy.
Panaromic view of Antalya to be seen from the observatory tower was the main intention.
The tower has three levels for visitors, with closed an semi-open spaces on the first and second floor and open space on the 3rd level as open terraces.
The skylights at each of the 3 terraces lets the sunlight in at the second level of tower and enables vision of the sky.
The core of the building, which has 2 fire escape stairs, 2 panaromic elevators, 1 fire elevator and mechanical rooms, is made up of concrete. The steel columns carrying the observation terraces is connected to the concrete core. The floors of the terraces are a combination of concrete and steel. Anchorage and bolt are used to connect concrete and steel parts of the building. Wind map of Antalya has been examined and planning of the tower has been done accordingly to the wind forces. From further anaylsis, the core of the building being a circle plays a good role on the forces of the wind and vortex effect on the building. On the facade, diagonal components have been used to increase security and inactivate the effects of the wind forces.
The tower stands 100.7 m tall. It has 1 basement floor,1 mechanical floor, 2 closed and 1 open obervatory terraces. 10 million visitors are expected for “The World Botanical Expo Antalya” which will start on april 23rd 2016.