Structure: VakkoFashion Center and PowerMedia Center

Architect: REXArchitecture, the Manhattan-based firm of Joshua Prince-Ramus former partner of architecture starRem Koolhaas at his Office for Metropolitan Architecture.

Clients: Vakko andPower Media

Location:Istanbul, Turkey

History: CemHakko, CEO of Vakko and Power Media, hired REX to build the company headquarters in 2008, when he was visiting NewYork for fashion week. Hakko told the firm that it had about a year to completethe project. Taking an adaptive reuse approach, the group applied plans for acanceled project at the California Institute of Technology to an abandoned skeleton in Istanbul — an unfinished hotel that had been unoccupied for 20 years. Coincidentally, the U-shapedskeleton of the site matched the dimensions of the canceled project, which spedup the process. Caltech's loss becameVakko and Power Media's gain, allowing for construction to begin a staggering four daysafter the commission was finalized in February 2008. By March 2009, REX had fulfilled Hakko's wishes: most of the structurewas complete. Vakko held the building's opening ceremony in January2010, and the building took its place as one of the gems of contemporaryarchitecture in Istanbul.

Cost: Confidential

Purpose: To serveas headquarters of Vakko, a luxury Turkish fashion retailer that createswomenswear, menswear, shoes, and more, as well as for Power Media, tantamount to Turkey's MTV.

Features: The Vakko Fashion and Power Media Center winner of the 2011Wallpaper magazine Design Award for Best Workspace is actually twostructurally independent components. It is comprised of a three-story, rectangulardoughnut-shaped building, dubbed "the Ring," that holds regular office space. This surrounds a taller, six-floor tower made from a stack of angled steel boxes,called "the Showcase," which houses executive offices, showrooms, anauditorium, and meeting rooms. Prince-Ramus repurposed the subterranean spacesoriginally intended to function as hotel's parking lot into radio and televisionstudios for Power Media.

The structures' two differentsurfaces make for an interesting contrast. The glass façadeon the Ring consists of window panes slumped with structural Xs to increasestrength, while the exterior of the Showcase is made of mirror-glass, giving its interior a kaleidoscope effect.