Merzifon Business and Life Center, which was obtained through the national competition organized by the Municipality of Merzifon in 2017, aims to be able to articulate with the urban form, with the spatial setup it describes and to find a place for itself within the context it belongs to. The building is located in the city center where the classical period Ottoman inns and commercial activity are intense. The network of spatial and morphological relations in the area shaped the architecture of the Business and Life Center. The design is based on systems logic, which argues that the whole is different from the sum of its simple parts. In the center of Merzifon, the proposed project instead of the old office building; houses various commercial units, offices, and cultural facilities. The habits created by the ongoing commercial uses in the city center have prepared the transformation of the vehicle roads around the parcel into pedestrian ways. Pedestrian ways located in the north and east of the area, the historical inns district, and the series of urban open spaces associated with Cumhuriyet Square were the elements that shaped the spatial and mass design of the project. The distribution of the functions in the architectural program within the parcel was carried out in this direction. The cultural facility is located in the north of the area in order to establish a more effective relationship with the city’s cultural axis. The business inn, on the other hand, is clustered around the stony ground in its own setup.
The building is located between the blocks formed by the adjacent structures produced on a parcel basis. Instead of a monolithic composition independent of the layout of the relatively small parcels around it, the building was able to be articulated to the urban texture formed by the parcel layout. In addition, the business and life center, which is formed by the combination of units with a plain and simple space setup, consists of simple architectural masses and combinations in a language that will integrate with the surrounding buildings. These concerns were reflected in various production phases, from the spatial organization of the building to the detail production, and were shaped around the construction budget of the employer. The intention to cover the initial construction cost with the sale of the commercial units in the office building and the lack of advanced building production technologies due to the district’s remote location from the center reveals the goal of a low-cost building that can be produced quickly with simple construction techniques.
The building, which is located on an area belonging to the municipality, is planned in units/parts in line with the various uses it accommodates, although it is located on a single parcel. This situation necessitated a detailed examination of the place of the project in the urban context. Merzifon Business and Life Center is a spatial organization that was built on public land and by the state, but the ownership passed to private individuals and institutions during the construction process. In this context, although the public and semi-public open spaces associated with the building still belong to the municipality, the building aims to be a part of the context to which it belongs, beyond the appearance of the municipality in the public space. This approach showed itself in the project from the very beginning of the competition process. The aim of interacting between space and context has been one of the factors affecting the design at different scales and phases, from the production of the spatial pattern to the shaping of the building envelope.
The cultural and commercial history of the city is also reflected in the usage habits in the region. Examining the spatial behavior patterns developed around structures with an effective “cell unit-circulation network” organization such as inns, bedestens and caravanserais provided a lot of data for the design. In this context, the importance of the courtyard, arcade and colonnade settlements in the establishment of the transitions between the unit and the whole of the building has been understood. The courtyard, which is connected to the series of open spaces of the city by passages and arcades, supported the continuity of behavioral habits in the region. It has enriched the spatial array by offering users the advantages of being both inside and outside. The stone architecture, which makes its presence felt in the traditional production codes of the region, was effective in the shaping of the building envelope. It is thought that the material is semantically important in establishing a relationship with the place and context it belongs to. The composition of the building consists of massive parts. It reveals a simple architectural production with stone and plaster surfaces. In addition, the sustainability of the construction economy is supported by the use of local materials, with the “Merzifon Beige” marble used on the façade. The cavities on the surfaces are designed to match the nature of the material and its tectonic effect. The ground floors, on the other hand, are designed relatively more permeable in order to establish the highest level of interaction with the urban space.
The organization of commercial units on the ground, which needs active visual communication, enriches the pedestrian movements around the building and the open-closed space transitions, offering a lively urban life. Organizing the units in accordance with the flexible planning approach of the building accelerated the production and made the usage differences possible. The demands of user groups, which diversified with the sale of commercial units, led to the conjoining, separation, and additions of units during the construction process. Management of the construction site and process under the influence of the increasing number of actors was founded on ensuring the balance between the employer, the contractor company, and the beneficiaries. Merzifon Business and Life Center aims to be articulated to the context it belongs to, through the logic of production and the relationship it establishes with the place. This building, which is similar to the surrounding buildings in terms of use, tries to overlap the morphological understanding of the city with the spatial variations it reveals. Thus, the simplicity in architecture; gains importance in describing the relationship of the building with the city, place, and context.