Istanbul Under Wraps
There’s this weird phenomenon I noticed around Istanbul, where several historic buildings are undergoing renovations, of wrapping the construction site in pictures of what the buildings look like. Or will look like. Or, since they’re being reconstructed, what they used to look like. What’s interesting, though, is that the scale of the image doesn’t always match the scale of the building, as seen here:
Also, pictured on the wrapper is a south elevation, though we’re looking at the eastern side of the building. This means that there’s also a disconnect between what’s on the wrapper and what’s behind it, not only spatially, but orientationally as well. Scale seems to be determined by the size of the scaffolding supporting the wrapper, not by any architectural standard. I guess the idea is to make people feel like they’re not missing out on what the buildings should look like, and pristine white line drawings replace the potential eyesores of construction. This resurfacing, however, is only superficial—entries for construction personel that cut into the fake façades bear no perspective line drawing, merely plywood and caution tape:
Here’s the side of that building:
And the side not yet wrapped:
I saw several examples of this type of wrapping, at Topkapi palace (above), the Archaeological Museum (below), and elsewhere around town (subsequent images):
