Reconstitution of the memory: Renovation of the Alsancak Cigarette Factory

Abstract

In parallel to the evolution of the extents of conservation discipline, the place has been the prior subject regarding its historical, architectural, symbolic, and social values. Heritage places that create bonds between past and future and links between societies and their environments forefronts as a reaction to change and forget. Due to the bonds that are created by experiences, feelings, and witnesses, heritage places turn into memory places. However, regarding the changes in their urban and social environments, the meaning of these places transforms and reforms as the objectives of remembering and forgetting, power and disgrace, glory and loss. In this context, this study focuses on the creation and transformation of a memory place: the Alsancak Cigarette Factory, an urban reminder of the industrialization process and the socio-economic progress of the city. The factory, which was established in 1884 as a part of the industrial zone of Izmir, holds an important place in the collective memory in terms of tobacco production besides being a place of belonging for the employees and their families. After its closure in 2004, the factory remained idle and physically damaged, and its urban impact was weakened. In 2018, it was renovated as a cultural hotpoint. With this study that defines the transformation process of the factory, the transformed meaning of the memory place, the impact of the intervention in this process and its new role in the urban identity is discussed.