Faruk Malhan

Background

About Faruk Malhan

Faruk Malhan studied basic design with Professor Fritz Janneba, an original representative of the Bauhaus School. He was the student of Mübeccel Kıray, one of the doyennes of Modern Sociology in Turkey and a close follower of Prof. İlhan Tekeli's classes and articles, as well as a follower of Professor Nusret Hızır's philosophy. The classes Malhan took from Professor Oya Köymen helped to shape his inter-disciplinary approach. With his education and practical experience in the field, he was one of the first people in Turkey to produce work and ideas in the field of design by bringing together its cultural, social, aesthetic and practical aspects. Following his dream of 'an industry serving design', Malhan formed a company,'Koleksiyon Mobilya', in Ankara in 1971 and began realizing his own designs. As Koleksiyon's chief designer today, he is also artistic director of the group as well as its design curator. Through years of dedication to design, art, craft, creativity and meticulous attention to detail, Malhan has taken Koleksiyon from a small-scale workshop when its was founded in 1971 to an integrated production plant today. The products he has designed have become part and parcel of people's everyday life both at home and abroad. A leader in the 70's and 80's when the concept of design first gained currency in Turkey, in June 2013 Faruk Malhan also pioneered in the founding of "Design Foundation Istanbul", whose passionately espoused mission is to bring design, with its international dimensions, to economies, societies, and cultures of production. In 2015, derived from the school of thought of ‘making-learning’, he founded Karya Academy Design Workshops within Design Foundation. The key theme of the workshops is to translate design thinking into ecomomies and society. Malhan is recently proceeding with his work on innovative approaches to social development models.