Dededağ is a farmhouse project that began during the Covid-19 period on a rural site near Hanzalı Village, surrounded by vineyards and gardens. Unlike a design practice accustomed to working within an urban context, the foothill setting—with no nearby buildings to serve as direct architectural references—became one of the project’s primary questions from the outset.

A key turning point in the design process came while spending time on the site, when a vaulted structure overlooking the plain was noticed in the distance. Further research revealed it to be an Armenian church dating from between the 10th and 12th centuries. The church’s vaults, together with the natural slope of Dede Mountain, became the principal references shaping the project’s architectural language.Rather than being conceived as a single mass, the house was designed as a fragmented composition spread across the site. The arched form of the mountain influenced the geometry of the living room, while vaulted forms informed the other volumes. The use of stone and timber as the primary materials shaped not only the architectural expression of the house, but also its construction process.Because of the limited legal and technical framework for the structural calculation of stone buildings in the region, the engineering process became one of the most intensively studied aspects of the project.Ultimately, Dededağ emerged as a farmhouse shaped by the topography, historical traces, and local material culture of its setting.