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Sumahan

Client: M&N Butler Architects
Art Director: Gülizar Çepoglu
Editor: Andrew Finkel
Designer: Aysun Pelvan
Photographer: Nazif Topçuoglu 

This luxurious, boutique, water-front hotel is located on the banks of the Bosphorus Straits, which separates Europe from Asia.

The concept is derived from the Bosphorus’s shimmering waters; transparency and reflection; and references the word “suma”, which means unadulterated, or invisible “sprit”.

The building was constructed in the 19th century as an industrial complex, housing and a distillery that produced the high-proof base for Raki, the Ottoman’s favourite tipple.

The logotype was designed to be transparent so that the scenery, with an ever-changing waterscape of fishermen, ferryboats and ships gliding by, will be made visible to visitors. Passing along the shore you may also read the modern architecture through it. In the printed materials the shimmering water is showcased through the logotype.

For this logotype I married the words and images; one does not exist without the other; the logotype becomes legible because of the imagery behind it. When designing this logotype I had in mind, Anne-Marie Christin’s book, L’image Ecrite (The Written Image), in which she explains how letters and words are images, first and foremost.