Gunseli Studio is about Mediterranean, wild flowers and innovative vegan materials. Inspired by the free-spirited, beautiful coastal style of the '90s, as remembered from the designer's childhood and her mother, Gunseli Studio offers a well-crafted blend of casual wear to contemporary styles, reflecting the diverse cultural influences of the time.
Photographic prints featuring Mediterranean Wild Flowers, captured by fashion designer Gunseli Turkay and her partner, cinematographer Burak Soley are the signature of the brand.
The collection includes unisex and women's ready-to-wear & printed scarves.
Mediterranean Wild Flowers_Bodrum
Captivated by the grace and beauty of wildflowers, they started photographing them. The aim? To reconnect people with nature and raise awareness about biodiversity conservation. Turkey's rich flora and the Mediterranean's threatened biodiversity became their passion project.
Mediterranean Wild Flowers celebrate and translate the fascinating beauty, sensuality, and information of endemic Mediterranean plants with prints and embroidery onto textiles, apparel, and objects. The brand processes producti on in an environmentally responsible and artisanal manner, safeguarding the Mediterranean's intangible heritage and fragile biodiversity. The collections will be launched simultaneously during the ephemeral outdoor environmental exhibitions. This first collection encompasses both Spring/Summer 2025 and Pre-Fall 2025
Gunseli Turkay
Gunseli Turkay, an internationally renowned innovative avant-garde fashion designer, holds an MA in 'Textile Innovation Design' from Accademia Costume é Moda in Rome. With a background in economics from Middle East Technical University in Ankara, Turkey, and fashion design from Accademia Italiana in Florence, Italy, Gunseli Turkay combines art and design to create remarkable and collaborative fashion collections.
Gunseli Turkay's artistic collaborations and creative conceptualization have gained recognition for their ability to merge various art forms. Inspired by art movements, Mediterranean botanics, Parisian influences, and experimental breakthroughs in art, photography, music, and film, Gunseli's work reflects her own involvement in these creative endeavors. Her collections exhibit a focus on perceptual phenomena, employing light, volume, and scale, often using transparent, translucent, or reflective materials with natural materials. She strives to innovate new plant-based materials through partnerships with industry leaders, seeking to shape the aesthetics of the future.
Dedicated to social and environmental sustainability, Gunseli consciously selects low-impact and innovative plant-based materials, shedding light on the conservation of plant and animal biodiversity. Her commitment to a better future for all is evident in her work.
Gunseli's talent lies in collaborating with diverse artists, resulting in collections that span womenswear, home textiles, and fabrics. These collaborations include artists such as Bora Akıncıturk, an abstract painter from London; Alper Derinboğaz, an architect from Istanbul; Refik Anadol, an internationally renowned media artist; Reuben Wu, a NatGeo photographer and PhaseOne Global Ambassador; and Burak Soley, a cinematographer from Istanbul, among others. These collections have been showcased at prestigious exhibitions like 'Who's Next,' 'Premium Berlin,' 'Berlin Fashion Week,' 'Istanbul Fashion Week,' 'Beymen in Istanbul,' 'Premier Vision & Maison Objet in Paris,' and have been featured in renowned locations such as 'Harrods London.' Additionally, the collections have achieved significant commercial success, being sold in approximately 50 designer boutiques and department stores worldwide.
Time Line _ Gunseli Turkay
Gunseli Studio
Creative Director and Founder
Feb 2022_Present, Istanbul
Kutnia
Consultant Creative Director and Designer for Kutnia
May 2017-Dec 2023
She worked as the consultant, creative director, and fashion designer for the start-up brand Kutnia. She developed the initial ideas and design methodology to revitalize the traditional fabric for a contemporary lifestyle brand. She redesigned the traditional kutnu fabric with new color stories and stripe designs without changing the traditional features of the fabric. With the newly created kutnu fabric, she designed a new lifestyle brand, including a womenswear line, accessories, and home textiles. She created the concept and the special collection by re-imagining an abstract expression of Zeugma Mosaics through artist collaboration, which became the best-selling cult line for the house. My role included creative direction, textile design, womenswear design, and home textile design for the first five years.
Günseli Türkay Brand
Contemporary Women's Brand of Artist Collaborations, Founder
April 2009–February 2017: Istanbul
Drawn to an eclectic mix of high fashion and edgy streetwear, the brand employed a concept that fuses art & fashion with fields of contemporary art, culture, architecture, and nature, considering environmental, social, and animal rights.
Runways & Fairs (attended with Günseli Türkay Brand)
Art & Fashion Collaborations
Pasaj Istanbul Fashion, Textile, and Print Design Studio
Fashion Designer and Founder
July 2006 – May 2011, Macka, Istanbul
Gunseli Turkay created Pasaj Istanbul as a design office in Istanbul for fashion design, print design, concept development, sourcing, fabric, and material research for brands and suppliers.
The Resource I Sourcing Agent of Mexx
Fashion Designer, Fabrics & Material Research and Development Specialist
January 2003 – May 2006, Istanbul
Mudo
Menswear Designer
July 2000 – December 2002, Istanbul
Mudo is a lifestyle brand with 130 shops in Turkey.
EDUCATION
Accademia Costume é Moda, Roma
Masters in Fabrics Innovation Design, Feb 2020–May 2021
Rilievi Embroidery, Bologna, Embroidery Crafts and Design, April 2021
Accademia Italiana, Firenze
Fashion Design, 1999–2000
ODTÜ I METU Middle East Technical University, Ankara
B.A., Economics, 1995–1999
AWARDS
Full Scholarship for Master in Fabrics Innovation Design
Accademia Costume é Moda, Roma, 2020
Mediterranean Fashion Prize, Maison Mode Mediterranean (MMM), Marseille, 2016
Re-Imagine Design Challenge for C&A, Madrid, 2012
Nominated for Young Fashion Designer, Elle Style Awards, Istanbul, 2010
First Place in Young Fashion Entrepreneur Award, British Council, Istanbul & London, 2010