Burj Al Babas may have been built specifically to capture the attention of the internet. “This town, located near the Black Sea, is full of small half-finished and completely abandoned castles. 587 of them to be exact.” write architectural digestKatherine McLaughlin and Jessica Cherner. Originally planned as a “luxurious and stately urban development that would provide the appearance of royal living for those who wanted to spend $370,000 to $500,000 to build their own little palace,” it is now It has become an unfinished ghost town. And even though the project only broke ground a decade ago, it has already settled into a truly eerie and highly photogenic state of disrepair.
This, of course, suits the sensibilities of adventure-oriented YouTube channels like: Be fearless and go far. Exploring Burj Al Babas – One of some such video Currently available — offers a ground-level view of what can only be described as the ruins of the town. “This fantastical paradise was not sold,” says the organizer. “Some people blame Turkey’s real estate crisis. Some people blame it on kitsch. It’s so strange. It’s all so fake.”
In fact, McLaughlin and Cherner wrote that “as construction began on the town, local residents became enraged by both the aesthetics of the homes and the business practices of the developers,” and subsequently declared bankruptcy, leaving the development in limbo. He wrote:
Those who know Middle Eastern languages recognize that the name Burj al-Babas itself is, as Ruth Michelson and Beryl Esqui put it, “a nonsensical combination of Arabic and Turkish.” Probably. be familiar with guardian Last month’s works. Although we are in Türkiye, we wanted to use the local hot springs, It was funded with funds from Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. The project has become a “strange white elephant” since construction “was abruptly halted in 2016,” sparking scandals, lawsuits, suicide attempts, and “even a minor diplomatic incident between Turkey and Kuwait.” . Anyone who has seen Burj Al Babas up close will have doubts about its prospects for completion. But if you have your own YouTube channel, you probably don’t want the demolition to start before you can visit it yourself.
Related content:
Visit to Tiandu City, China’s eerie sky’s billion dollar copy of Paris
Discovering a ghost town in Japan – a scarecrow takes the place of a man and a man lives in the gym of an abandoned elementary school
Explore the largest of Italy’s 6,000 ghost towns: Take a tour of Craco, Italy
Discover the disappearing Turkish language that is no longer spoken with whistles
A cultural tour of Istanbul that brings together the art and history of three great empires
Based in Seoul, Colin Mbemust write and broadcastIt’s about cities, languages and cultures. His projects include the Substack newsletter books about cities and a book Stateless City: A Stroll Through Los Angeles in the 21st Century. Follow him on Twitter @Colinbemust or facebook.
Source: Open Culture – www.openculture.com
