Merve Bedir

Merve Bedir is an architect based in Hong Kong/Shenzhen. Her ongoing research examines infrastructures of hospitality and mobility. She also works on the relationship between urban transformation and public space, connecting law, labour, technology, and urban politics. A third line of research follows the human and nonhuman relationships in the context of ecology and cybernetics. Merve Bedir is an adjunct assistant professor in Hong Kong University Department of Architecture, Division of Landscape Architecture, and a founding partner of Land and Civilization Compositions. She is also a co-founder of Aformal Academy (an experimental school program in Pearl River Delta region), a founding member of Mutfak مطبخ Workshop (focusing on Kitchen as a cultural space in Gaziantep), and a founding member of Center for Spatial Justice in Istanbul. Merve Bedir holds a PhD from Architectural Engineering Department in Delft University of Technology, and a BArch from Middle East Technical University in Ankara.
Merve curated uncommon river (Plovdiv, Bulgaria, 2015), Vocabulary of Hospitality (Istanbul, 2015), and co-curated Automated Landscapes (Shenzhen, 2017 and 2019). Most recently her work Unsettled Urbanism has been presented/exhibited in Matadero Madrid (2020), and Venice Biennale (2021), Floor Table in Smithsonian Museum (2021), Gold Water: Landscapes of Olives in Istanbul Design (2018), and Bunk Bed in Saõ Paulo (2019) Biennales. She wrote in Harvard Design Magazine, AD Magazine, The Funambulist among others. Merve’s work was awarded by Prins Claus Foundation, European Cultural Foundation, EU Creative Europe program, UNDP, and Europan; and has been reviewed in The Guardian, Metropolis magazine, and Avery Review.