Current makeover is first time site will undergo \u201cglobal restoration\u201d, including dome, walls and minarets
\n ISTANBUL
\nThe Hagia Sophia of Istanbul is no stranger to change \u2014 through the centuries the city\u2019s architectural jewel has gone from church to mosque to museum, back to mosque again.
\nBut the latest renovation aims not only to restore the wonders of the 1,488-year gem, but to ensure it survives the next earthquake to hit the ancient city.
\nFrom afar, its dome, shimmering rock and delicate minarets appear to watch over Istanbul, as they have for centuries.
\nAs visitors get closer however, they see scaffolding covering its eastern facade and one of the minarets.
\nWhile \u201cthe renovation of course breaks a little bit the atmosphere of the appearance from the outside\u201d and the \u201cscaffolding takes away the aesthetic of the monument… renovation is a must,\u201d said Abdullah Yilmaz, a guide.
\nHagia Sophia, a World Heritage Site and Turkiye\u2019s most visited landmark, \u201cconstantly has problems\u201d, Hasan Firat Diker, an architecture professor working on the restoration, told AFP.
\nThat is why it has undergone numerous piecemeal reconstructions over the centuries, he added.
\n\u2018Global\u2019 makeover
\nThe current makeover is the first time the site will undergo a \u201cglobal restoration\u201d, including the dome, walls and minarets, he said.
\nWhen it was first completed in AD 537, on the same spot where previous churches had stood, the Hagia Sophia became known as a shining example of the architecture of the Byzantine Empire, which ruled the city known as Constantinople at the time.
\nIt served as a church until the fall of the city to the Ottomans in 1453, when it became a mosque.
\nIn 1935, Mustafa Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey who forcibly remade the country into a secular one, turned the building into a museum.
\nIt remained as such until 2020, when President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a practising Muslim who came to power at the head of an Islamist-rooted party, turned it back into a mosque.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Current makeover is first time site will undergo \u201cglobal restoration\u201d, including dome, walls and minarets ISTANBUL The Hagia Sophia of Istanbul is no stranger to change \u2014 through the centuries the city\u2019s architectural jewel has gone from church to mosque to museum, back to mosque again. But the latest renovation aims not only to restore […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":472978,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-472969","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n