Dirty City: a text by Ömer Kanıpak from the pages of NCR06 “Industry”

The industrial areas once embraced for playing the leading role in the develeopment of cities and providing the people with the very means of survival, are seen after a while as rusty heaps of junk to be cleared away and dirty areas to be wiped out. Reflecting the rest of the world, Istanbul is also undergoing a similar transformation: low-storey industrial areas where small and middle scale production is carried out have now become objects of desire for “luxury residences” and shopping centres. Ateliers and workshops are pushed towards organized industrial areas outside the city. Small enterprises are forced to grow in size. All traces of a considerable number of small and middle scale production units in Istanbul have been wiped out. The last remaining ones are about to be wiped out. In Kazlıçeşme, there are but a few chimneys left indicating the former existence of leather factories. Starting with Yedikule, gashouses have been uprooted and those remaining are left to perish. The shores of Haliç have been scraped and cleaned, creating uncanny empty spaces and pointlessly green areas. In order to make sense of these spaces, there is now a need to build dolphin pools and decorated parks. There is no trace of patina and form to remind us that the new congress center built to hold important meetings was once the city’s foremost slaughterhouse. All of it has been covered with shiny granite. The valleys of Kağıthane and Cendere are now subject to the pressure of new undeserved profits to be gained from the marketing of prestige and status. The electric power station and the tobacco factory were relatively fortunate enough to be converted into university complexes.

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New City Reader, the newspaper of Istanbul Design Biennial continues to permeate the city with its latest issue “Endüstri/ Industry”. Guest edited by Ömer Kanıpak, the issue highlights the relocated industrial areas and the removal of production from the city as a part of its urban transformation projects. Aslı Kıyak İngin (Re-evaluating the Future of Small Production Sites in Istanbul), Ayça İnce (Do We Have the Vision to Transform Industry-With-Chimneys to Cultural Industries?), Ayşe Çavdar – Sevin Yıldız (New Housing Areas Where Hunger is Satieted with More Industry) , Pınar Gökbayrak (Shared Wisdom Interfusing Industrial Heritage with the City), Sevim Sancaktar (“Scenes” of Transformers) and Yıldız Salman (Mecidiyeköy Liqueur Factory – A Modern Architectural “Value” or and Investment Potential) are among the contributes of the issue.