Project . Ahlat Youth Center National Architectural Competition
Client . Ahlat Municipality
Area . 10000 m² closed 30000 m² total Site . Bitlis / Turkey Year . 2017
Program . Recreation Area, Sports Areas, Housing Units, Accommodation, Restaurant
Project Team .Ali Sinan, Hasan Okan Çetin, Nehir Bera Biçer, Nuran Özkam, Okan Mutlu Akpınar
There are two states of the earth; solid and liquid.
“While the plains, mountains, and valleys often do not change shape; lakes, seas, streams express constant change, fluidity, and an untenable truth, […] waters express freedom and openness with their fluidity and softness.” Jale N. Erzen / Üç Habitus: Yeryüzü, Kent, Yapı
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Ahlat, the red city of the east, leans on the foothills of the Nemrut and Suphan mountains on the northwest coast of Lake Van. It itself exists with two powerful and iconic solids and a liquid border. This land, which has turned its face to the lake between the two mountains, is undoubtedly one of the strong representations of the solid and liquid form of the earth in one body.
Ahlat Youth Camp Project area transmits the characteristic of being defined by the solid and liquid boundaries coming from the upper scale to the lower scale. The Ağrı-Bitlis Highway separating the land as the North and South regions, the water channels breaking the area by leaking into the North region and the coastline defining the South region can be defined as the constraints for the lower scales.
Due to the mentioned sub-limiters create a limited relation between the city and the water; it is obviously possible to speak of a distinct solid-liquid or stationary-fluid separation. While the project creates an intermediate phase in the city-lake and solid-liquid transition; it also aims to increase the fluidity of the static movement coming from the city and deliver it to the water, which is the expression of change and freedom. This approach leads to the search for a scheme that will work both for the daily user profile and the one that will take place in Ahlat Youth Camp occasionally. Although an intensive program is added to a land divided by the mentioned borders, it is possible to have a visual contact with the water or reach it without any obstacles by entering the site from the north. In the mass articulation, the conference center is located separately from the accommodation and spa units; and an intermediate backbone was created as a basis for an uninterrupted fluid pedestrian movement for both daily and program users. The social spaces are positioned parallel to the main road façade, taking into account the relationship with the city and maximum use of the lake vista. For the accommodation units that are located perpendicular to the lake in two arms shape, the visual relationship with the lake was taken into consideration and thus convenient inner courtyards were created. In the conference center, it is aimed to provide a lake vista from the foyer, to have a direct access to the city and to be included to the backbone organization with its open amp. The masses were designed with pitched roofs, and the Ahlat Stone, which gave Ahlat its reputation as the red city of the east, found its place in the design by creating contrasts in the façade characteristics.
With its natural and historical multilayered structure, Ahlat becomes a hospitable environment for a youth center. While Ahlat Youth Camp will create a new interface for a weak city-lake relationship in the long term, it also lays the groundwork for interwoven solid and fluid relations.
