The conference brought hundreds of innovators of urban change from 15 countries, half a dozen mayors, renowned scholars and authors side-by-side with architects and developers who are leading major urban regeneration projects around the globe in İstanbul, a city described as “an expanding metropolis and one of the world’s first global cities” by the organizers.According to a statement from Urban Age, the conference -- organized by the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and Deutsche Bank’s Alfred Herrhausen Society -- sought to engage its audience, made up of urban policymakers, academics, designers, planners and developers “to explore the vast and complex challenge of contemporary city making and the interconnected issues of the impact of the global economic condition on world cities, the effect of climate change on urban sustainability and the role of urban design in creating socially cohesive environments.”
Meanwhile, the organizers also announced that the Deutsche Bank Urban Age Award went to a community music project in İstanbul called Barış İcin Müzik (Music for Peace). The project, based in İstanbul’s Edirnekapı district, offers music classes to local schoolchildren between the ages of 7 and 14 and recently completed a new facility for musical training and performance for talented teenagers in the heart of their community. The $100,000 award was presented at the Seed at the Sabancı Museum in İstanbul on Nov. 4 by Dr. Josef Ackermann, the CEO of Deutsche Bank; Ali Babacan, the deputy prime minister of Turkey; and the mayor of İstanbul, Kadir Topbaş.
