Architects’ journeys to Italy and their contribution to architectural culture in postwar-era Turkey

In the twentieth century, the mobility of architects and ideas played an important role in the dissemination of an architecture culture characterised by modernity. Architectural ideas were disseminated through institutions and a variety of visual, verbal, and textual representations as well as physical encounters. Travel, with its associated architectural thinking and representation, became a generative practice through which the dissemination of architecture could be understood. The Grand Tour was one of the most well-studied examples of travel as a rite of passage, and Italy remained a dominant destination long after its peak in the eighteenth century. Italian architectural discourse entered Turkey through travels and publications, mostly in the prewar era. This article aims to show the role of architects’ travels in inducing architectural productions through a variety of representations from sketches to published media, scrutinising Turkish-speaking architects’ journeys to Italy in the postwar era. The study incorporates content analysis of selected media - such as photographs, articles, class notes, books, and memoirs - to review architects’ productions during and after their travels, as they facilitated the dissemination of an architecture culture ‘brought back’ after key experiences.