Emre Arolat, one of the most important architects of Turkey, will be the second speaker of the conference series on ‘Contemporary Religious Architecture in the Mediterranean World’, which is jointly organised by the Dominican Study Institute-Istanbul (Dost-I) and the Department of Sociology of Istanbul Medeniyet University, with Assoc. Prof. Dr. Erhan Berat Fındıklı as the project senior manager, and also with the contribution of Depo Pergamon, Istituto Italiano di Cultura – Istanbul, Instituto Cervantes de Estambul.

Born into a family of architects, Emre Arolat started his professional life in 1987 in the architectural office of Neşet and Şaziment Arolat, Arolat Architecture, and founded EAA in 2004. He continues his professional life on an international level with offices in Istanbul, London and New York.

With the Sancaklar Mosque project in Büyükçekmece, Istanbul, Arolat has achieved a design innovation that has never been attempted before in Turkey. This building, which received many international awards, initiated a fruitful theoretical dialogue on the design possibilities of religious architecture. In his presentation at the Sen Piyer Church in Galata, Emre Arolat will discuss the concept, preliminary design and implementation phases of Sancaklar Mosque as well as his personal approach to religious architecture.