Old and New | The Antalya Archaeological Museum

Mavi Boncuk | The Ministry of Culture and Tourism announced that a new museum to replace the Antalya Archaeological Museum, will be one of Türkiye's largest. 

The Antalya Archaeological Museum, one of Turkey's largest museums, closed its doors to visitors on July 16, 2025, after earthquake analyses determined its building was at risk. After the safe relocation of nearly 100,000 artifacts to designated storage areas, the museum was demolished using heavy equipment.

The areas used as storage and housing within the museum campus were initially demolished by the heavy equipment.

The museum to be built on the site of the Antalya Archaeological Museum will be approximately twice the size of the existing structure, with 19,500 square meters of indoor space and 22,677 square meters of outdoor space. The exhibition halls will be expanded by over 160 percent, and artifacts currently in storage will also be available for visitors.

The new museum project will also triple its storage capacity, ensuring the collections are preserved in modern and safe conditions.

The Antalya Archaeological Museum, designed by architects Doğan Tekeli [1], Sami Sisa, and Metin Hepgüler, won a national architectural competition in 1964. In the same competition, Şaziment Arolat and Neşet Arolat's project was awarded second place, while Dr. Hayati Tabanlıoğlu and Yusuf Ergüleç's project was awarded third place.

The jury's justification for awarding the 13th-place project first prize:

“The layout of the site plan, which allows for rich exhibition gardens and courtyards to the south; the museum entrance being a side street, which offers attractive perspectives upon entering the museum hall from there; the sections' appropriate design for their display function and the appropriate lighting; the lapidarium's interesting design, which aligns with the program; the roof levels' provision of lighting and natural ventilation, and their mitigating effect on the masses; the location of the residences and the connection of the sections to the technical facilities; and the effective solution of interior and exterior circulation were all considered appropriate… This project was deemed worthy of the 1st Prize.”

Opened in 1972 and characterized as an example of Turkish modernist architecture, it attracted attention for its distinctive design and, while controversial, its reflection of the local context. In 1988, it was awarded the "Special Award for Museum of the Year" by the Council of Europe.

The museum's registration application to the Cultural Heritage Preservation Board was rejected, and demolition began on September 14 and was completed by September 17.

Doğan Tekeli He expressed his sadness when he watched the footage by saying, "I felt like the excavators were hitting my head." And added that “

The Danıştay /Council of State building he designed in Ankara and a bank building he designed in Istanbul had previously been demolished, and that the Antalya Archaeological Museum was the third building to be demolished and the one that caused the most pain.

Regarding the copyrights on the destroyed building, Tekeli said, "The copyright issue isn't entirely clear. The laws regulating copyrights aren't very clear. There are two types of copyrights: material and moral rights. Material rights are the rights you have from designing the building. You also have moral rights. The copyright law states that moral rights cannot be transferred, but what moral rights are isn't fully defined… Due to the lack of a clear definition of moral rights in the law, if a new building is being considered to replace the demolished building, at least to compensate for the moral damages arising from the demolition, the architect/designer of the demolished building should be given the opportunity to submit a design for the planned new structure. This is the ethical approach. Baraka Architecture, which was announced to design the new building, approached me. Eleven projects were submitted to the Ministry, and the Minister selected one from among them. "

He also added that “There was no obstacle to building a new museum, or a better one. Was there no land in Antalya? If this museum had been preserved and a new one built, it would have been magnificent. This museum would have been used as an old museum. What city has only one museum? No one opposes a new museum.”

The project architect has issued a statement regarding the recent public debate surrounding the Antalya Archaeological Museum. Architect Abdülrahman Çekme[2] , founder of Baraka Architecture, which is leading the museum project, responded to allegations raised at a meeting organized by the Provincial Directorate of Culture and Tourism.

Emphasizing transparency regarding the project process, Çekme said, “The meeting held in February was not a closed meeting. Many relevant individuals attended this meeting, organized by the City Council. A representative from the Chamber of Architects and members of the City Council were present. We explained the project in detail and held a meeting that lasted approximately two to three hours.”

Çekme also emphasized their openness to participants' ideas and suggestions, saying, “At the end of the meeting, we said, ‘Please prepare your reports, send them to us, and we will evaluate them.’ Allegations that we conducted a closed process or rejected ideas are untrue.”

[1] Doğan Tekeli was born in Isparta in 1929. He graduated from ITU Faculty of Architecture as a master architectural engineer in 1952. He worked for a while in the Izmir Municipality Project Office. In 1954, he founded the Site Architecture Office together with Sami Sisa. This office continues its existence today as the Tekeli-Sisa Architecture Partnership. In addition to his freelance architectural work, Doğan Tekeli also worked as a consultant in the preparation of the Izmir Municipality Konak Site projects together with Sami Sisa in 1955, as an assistant at the Academy of Fine Arts in 1956, as a project course teacher at the Architecture Department of ITU Maçka Architecture and Engineering School between 1961-1971, and as the President of the Chamber of Architects for a period in 1957; he served as a member of the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Advisory Board between 1985-1989; he was elected as a member of the National Committee of the Atatürk Culture, Language and History Supreme Institution in 1988; He served as a jury member and president of the Aga Khan Awards for Architecture in 1992 and 1998, and served on the board of directors of the same institution from 1994 to 1995. He served as a board member and vice president of the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts from 1998 to 2010. He was elected president of the Istanbul Association of Freelance Architects from 2006 to 2008.

Doğan Tekeli was awarded the National Architecture Grand Prize of the Chamber of Architects in 1994. In 2000, he received an Honorary Doctorate from Istanbul Technical University. In 2010, he was awarded the Honorary Award of the Turkish Association of Freelance Architects. 

He won over sixty awards, including nearly thirty first-place awards, in architectural competitions, in which he participated alongside Sami Sisa. He has undertaken one hundred and eighty projects, approximately one hundred and twenty of which have been completed. These include the Rumeli Hisarı landscaping, the Istanbul Drapers' Bazaar, the Emin Onat tomb, the Undersecretariat of the Treasury, Halkbank General Directorate, Antalya Airport Terminals 1 and 2, the Oyak-Renault, Lassa, Eczacıbaşı, and Sanovel Pharmaceutical Factories, the Istanbul Metro City Complex, İşbank General Directorate, the Habertürk Studios and Offices, and the New Terminal of Sabiha Gökçen International Airport. Some of his works were exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 1982.

In addition to his professional articles, seminar proceedings, and conferences, his buildings and projects were widely published in the domestic and international architectural press. A Turkish-English book titled "Doğan Tekeli-Sami Sisa projects – applications. architectural works 1954-1974," which covers the first twenty years of his work, was published in 1975; and a Turkish book titled "Projects, Structures, Doğan Tekeli-Sami Sisa (1974-1994)" was published in 1994. His book, “Architecture: Difficult Art,” which includes his professional experiences and memories, was published in 2012.

From Çebiş House to Hisartepe 

Doğan Tekeli, a leading figure in contemporary architecture who previously drew attention with his book "Mimarlık: Zor Sanat" (Architecture: Zor Sanat), which compiled his professional memoirs, has written about his life in this book. Born in Isparta, the first child of a civil servant family, Doğan Tekeli graduated from Istanbul Technical University's Faculty of Architecture in 1952 after growing up in Izmir and Istanbul. He worked for sixty years at the Tekeli-Sisa architectural firm, which he founded with Sami Sisa. Having previously shared details of his professional life in "Mimarlık: Zor Sanat," Tekeli has now turned to his own story. From Çebiş House to Hisartepe is an autobiographical book. Doğan Tekeli recounts his fascinating memories in engaging language while also reflecting on Turkey's social transformations, politics and economics, and public-private sector relations from the perspective of the architectural profession.

Simply writing professional memoirs about my life wasn't enough for me. I found writing difficult because I was thinking as if I were working on an architectural project, constantly revising my writing. However, since I considered myself a member of the first generation of the Republican era, I wanted to share the environments in which I grew up and the conditions of the time. At the same time, I was wondering, "Who should be interested in my life story, and why?" I was in a dilemma. I began to enjoy remembering my childhood, the two-hundred-year-old Çebiş House in Isparta where I was born, and the old Isparta. Many details were right before my eyes. At one point, I started writing.

[2] Abdurrahman Çekim was born in Iğdır in 1978. He graduated from the Faculty of Architecture at YTU in 2003.

He began working with Emre Arolat in his second year of undergraduate studies. He worked on the design and implementation of various scale projects at Emre Arolat Architecture until 2006. He then joined DB Architecture between 2006 and 2009. Since 2009, he has been working at Baraka Architecture, which he founded with Sevilay Uğur Çekim. He won Honorable Mention Awards in the Edirne Municipality Selimiye Mosque Surroundings Urban Project Competition and the Kadirli Municipality Service Building and Cultural Center National Competition. He was also nominated for the National Architecture Awards in the Construction Category for his Maksimum Evler Sales Office project.

(Pictured: Eyüp Municipality Wedding Hall]

he most notable structures he designed under Emre Arolat are the Eyüp Municipality Wedding Hall and the Maksimum Evler Sales Office. At DB Architecture, he designed the Dumankaya Minimal Residences with Bünyamin Derman, the MFI and AVM Partners Adana Shopping Mall, and the Istanbloom projects.

Baraka Architecture has completed numerous projects in its short five-year history. He was also featured in the 2010 Young Architect Profile in Arredamento Architecture Magazine. 

In 2013, Çekak facilitated the "Perception and Misconception" Workshop at MSGSÜ. In 2011, he participated as a speaker in the "Land and Housing Production After 1950" seminar held in Lucerne, Switzerland. In 2014, he gave a talk on "Architectural Practice and Production Processes" at Eskişehir Osmangazi University.

Baraka Mimarlik

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