ATÖLYE
What is ATÖLYE?
ATÖLYE is a transdisciplinary innovation platform that provides a creative and innovative foundation for its team and community of designers, technologists, social scientists and entrepreneurs to develop new collaborations and projects with long-term value. ATÖLYE undertakes client projects and joint ventures, in which it adopts a human-centered design approach to derive unique insights and solutions.
Could you describe a day at ATÖLYE?
Various levels of interaction between people and events take place simultaneously at ATÖLYE on a daily basis. Events that touch upon the subjects of technology, design and entrepreneurship are likely to take place simultaneously with community events, including the 101 classes and feedback sessions, where members share their opinions and areas of expertise with one another. While community members engage in joint ventures in meeting rooms, Makerlab would be filled with members and visitors interested in participating in CNC workshop.
What are your current highlights?
We are excited to have completed the AGU Summer School in partnership with the Abdullah Gul University, which consisted of an intensive and project-based learning module designed by ATÖLYE, that focused on UN's Sustainability goal, Urban Sustainability. We are also working on the PR operations for our spatial design project Private Sezin School Open Roof Space, which is a ‘beyond-classroom’ pedagogical space with a spatially hybrid program that fosters meeting, making, learning and working. We are advancing to the second challenge process for imece next month, which will focus on the theme of gender equality. Finally, we have been involved with a smart city application project in partnership with New Lab in New York for the last three months, and are preparing to take the insights from the research stage to the next level.
What are some of the challenges you face?
The socio-political and economic conditions that our country is currently faced with are one of our main challenges at the moment. As a creative hub, we are also affected by the current framework which does not facilitate the support and funding for the creative industries. The fact that our projects and mindsets are long-term does not necessarily go along with the current business culture that demands transient results in a short-time frame.
What excites you most about future?
We are looking forward to creating more value through collaborations and new ventures with NGOs, private and public institutions. We are hoping to continue working with the team and community members to engage with exciting projects from a wide range of related scopes and scales.
