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Şişli District Governor's Office
Şişli District Governor's Office
Istanbul, Türkiye
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Other Projects by Uygur Architects
Şişli District Governor's Office
Istanbul, Türkiye
Firm
Type
STATUS
Built
YEAR
2025
SIZE
10,000 sqft - 25,000 sqft
Urban Continuity and Tectonic Silence — Şişli District Governor's Office
The real test of architecture is not an empty site but the capacity to settle, with care, into an existing culture and its urban fabric. The Şişli District Governor's Office begins from this premise. It stands at precisely such an urban threshold , in Cumhuriyet Mahallesi, at the corner where Halaskargazi Caddesi meets İzzetpaşa Sokağı, on block 1002, plot 70.
Earlier, the same plot held the former Şişli Finance Office, a building bearing the signature of Münevver Belen, one of Turkey's first women architects. Over time this five-storey public building had lost its structural capacity in the face of Istanbul's seismic reality; unable to satisfy current codes, it had become a problem of urban safety. Once evacuated and left idle, its demolition and the construction of the District Governor's Office in its place were decided by the Istanbul Project Coordination Unit (İPKB) of the Istanbul Governorship. That decision is the inevitable consequence of a structural responsibility owed to the city. This compulsory transformation has been treated not as mere construction but as infill — an act of urban repair that mends the memory of the city, the rights of the neighbour, and the aura of the existing fabric.
The Rights of the Neighbour and the Conservation Council
Throughout the design, the listed historic building immediately adjacent to the site , on plot 69, along İzzetpaşa Sokağı , formed the centre of gravity for every decision. The guiding principle reads the party-wall condition imposed by the zoning code not as a building right that overwhelms the historic structure, but as a measured relationship of boundary with the past. Because of the listed building on the adjoining plot, the Istanbul Regional Conservation Council No. II was, in this process, more than a mandatory approval authority: it became a partner in the integrity of the city. Through the consultations held with the Council, the mass arrived at its final form ; one that does not bear down on the listed building but completes a fabric alongside it.
Mass, Proportion and Silence
The new building is a mediator between the dense built order of Halaskargazi Caddesi and the scale of the listed building on İzzetpaşa Sokağı. The programme is not resolved as a single monolithic block; the mass is broken into three parts that step down at different levels. This fragmentation echoes the rhythm of the narrow, vertical party-wall façades of Istanbul's traditional streets. At ±0.00 the building makes a civil, unmonumental entrance from the avenue; on İzzetpaşa Sokağı it meets the historic monument quietly, at +2.70. The floor areas are reduced deliberately toward the upper storeys ( from 340 m² below to 285 m² on the sixth ) so that the mass recedes markedly from the historic building. The sixth-floor terrace meets the eave line of the listed building; on the façade it shares with its neighbour, it nowhere rises above the height of the historic structure.
The Memory of Material and the Tectonics of the Façade
The fragmentation of the mass and its fusion with the existing fabric find their counterpart in the tectonics of the façade. Refusing the habitual logic of cladding and the now-banal glass façade, the project takes as its principal material the cross-cut Marmara marble that defines the urban fabric of Istanbul's historic building stock; the system detail, too, is conceived as a reinterpretation of this stone. The choice is not an aesthetic reflex but a decision that secures the building's permanence through a natural, deeply rooted material. The marble is never laid as a uniform surface; through varied assemblies and details it gives shape to the building's tectonics. In some places massive blocks are hung on bespoke mechanical fixings; in others a solid-and-void sequence breathes. Together they build a rhythm of real depth. This sober handling deepens the shadow the building casts in sunlight and makes a measured contribution to the street silhouette.
The memory of material does not stop at the façade; it is carried into the building. The palette of the interior is set with the same concern for continuity. Handmade ceramics bring the sense of craft and handwork found in the buildings of an earlier era into the present. The Marmara marble of the façade descends to the floor, binding outside and inside in a shared material language; the oak of floor and ceiling balances the hardness of the stone with its own warmth. The copper of the suspended ceiling at the entrance, in turn, lends the interior a single, measured accent.
The real test of architecture is not an empty site but the capacity to settle, with care, into an existing culture and its urban fabric. The Şişli District Governor's Office begins from this premise. It stands at precisely such an urban threshold , in Cumhuriyet Mahallesi, at the corner where Halaskargazi Caddesi meets İzzetpaşa Sokağı, on block 1002, plot 70.
Earlier, the same plot held the former Şişli Finance Office, a building bearing the signature of Münevver Belen, one of Turkey's first women architects. Over time this five-storey public building had lost its structural capacity in the face of Istanbul's seismic reality; unable to satisfy current codes, it had become a problem of urban safety. Once evacuated and left idle, its demolition and the construction of the District Governor's Office in its place were decided by the Istanbul Project Coordination Unit (İPKB) of the Istanbul Governorship. That decision is the inevitable consequence of a structural responsibility owed to the city. This compulsory transformation has been treated not as mere construction but as infill — an act of urban repair that mends the memory of the city, the rights of the neighbour, and the aura of the existing fabric.
The Rights of the Neighbour and the Conservation Council
Throughout the design, the listed historic building immediately adjacent to the site , on plot 69, along İzzetpaşa Sokağı , formed the centre of gravity for every decision. The guiding principle reads the party-wall condition imposed by the zoning code not as a building right that overwhelms the historic structure, but as a measured relationship of boundary with the past. Because of the listed building on the adjoining plot, the Istanbul Regional Conservation Council No. II was, in this process, more than a mandatory approval authority: it became a partner in the integrity of the city. Through the consultations held with the Council, the mass arrived at its final form ; one that does not bear down on the listed building but completes a fabric alongside it.
Mass, Proportion and Silence
The new building is a mediator between the dense built order of Halaskargazi Caddesi and the scale of the listed building on İzzetpaşa Sokağı. The programme is not resolved as a single monolithic block; the mass is broken into three parts that step down at different levels. This fragmentation echoes the rhythm of the narrow, vertical party-wall façades of Istanbul's traditional streets. At ±0.00 the building makes a civil, unmonumental entrance from the avenue; on İzzetpaşa Sokağı it meets the historic monument quietly, at +2.70. The floor areas are reduced deliberately toward the upper storeys ( from 340 m² below to 285 m² on the sixth ) so that the mass recedes markedly from the historic building. The sixth-floor terrace meets the eave line of the listed building; on the façade it shares with its neighbour, it nowhere rises above the height of the historic structure.
The Memory of Material and the Tectonics of the Façade
The fragmentation of the mass and its fusion with the existing fabric find their counterpart in the tectonics of the façade. Refusing the habitual logic of cladding and the now-banal glass façade, the project takes as its principal material the cross-cut Marmara marble that defines the urban fabric of Istanbul's historic building stock; the system detail, too, is conceived as a reinterpretation of this stone. The choice is not an aesthetic reflex but a decision that secures the building's permanence through a natural, deeply rooted material. The marble is never laid as a uniform surface; through varied assemblies and details it gives shape to the building's tectonics. In some places massive blocks are hung on bespoke mechanical fixings; in others a solid-and-void sequence breathes. Together they build a rhythm of real depth. This sober handling deepens the shadow the building casts in sunlight and makes a measured contribution to the street silhouette.
The memory of material does not stop at the façade; it is carried into the building. The palette of the interior is set with the same concern for continuity. Handmade ceramics bring the sense of craft and handwork found in the buildings of an earlier era into the present. The Marmara marble of the façade descends to the floor, binding outside and inside in a shared material language; the oak of floor and ceiling balances the hardness of the stone with its own warmth. The copper of the suspended ceiling at the entrance, in turn, lends the interior a single, measured accent.
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