Antakya City Center Pilot Project Area Residential Campus

  • Project Date: 2024
  • Location: Antakya
  • Client: TTV
  • Project Team: Cem İlhan, Tülin Hadi, Ayşegül Ersin, Almira Su Köker, Efe Toz

The architectural project developed by TeCe Architecture is located in the pilot project area that aims to revive the city center of Hatay, one of the cities most affected by the Kahramanmaraş-centered earthquake that occurred on February 6, 2023, and to keep the cultural heritage and the city alive. The project mainly benefits from decisions and digital data within the framework of the master plan, within the framework of design and project studies carried out by the collaboration platform created by the Turkish Design Foundation. In accordance with the principles determined in the same master plan, additional housing units were not proposed in the neighborhoods within the project borders, keeping the demographic structure and rights in the neighborhoods at pre-earthquake values. Thus, preserving the previous neighborhood relations and property rights and not bringing additional population into the region. All these mutual changes are targeted towards the owners of the housing units located closest to the pre-earthquake property units.

 

The essence of the project is the reinterpretation of the traditional Antakya courtyard building culture. Beyond being a purely formal decision, courtyards offer residents a living experience where they will be in touch with nature. These courtyards encourage social interaction vertically and strengthen neighborly relations horizontally. The courtyard building morphology offers a pleasant and peaceful atmosphere based on Hatay’s warm climate.

 

The building island that is the subject of the design has a structure that is more integrated with public and urban life at the periphery, but is more introverted and semi-public in the courtyard spaces produced behind the blocks that form the island perimeter, but will also encourage neighborly relations. Inner courtyards will produce a safe, vehicle-free, peaceful daily life. The block entrances are taken from the street in the units forming the perimeter of the building island on Oymak, Yeşil and Mimar Sinan Streets, and from the inner courtyards in the blocks within the island and the blocks facing Cengiz Street. In order to increase neighborhood relations and pedestrian flow, direct access to the courtyard is provided from the ground floors of the series of blocks. In this way, it is strengthened that the residents of the flats encounter each other and share a common daily life integrated with the green area.

 

In the settlement layout, commercial use has been continued at the ground level along Cengiz Street, taking into account the reciprocity and continuity of the ground functions envisaged in the main plan and in the neighboring stages. Adjacent wall blocks were broken off in places, softening the mass effect and providing direct pedestrian access to the island from different directions. The blocks were operated with their own separate cores, and the habits from the apartment typology that existed before the earthquake were provided in a way that would not create any alienation, but this time in an adjacent order. Thus, the requested privacy was also achieved.

 

The ground floors along Oymak Street, Mimar Sinan Street and Yeşil Street are left to the residences. It was aimed and achieved that the units specified in the requirements program would be settled comfortably and parallel to the slope of the land itself, and that level entrances would be obtained from the surrounding streets to facilitate the daily life of the disabled, the elderly and families with babies. In addition to this ease of access, disabled people can easily circulate in the open areas of the residences. The low-rise block layout determined in the master plan was followed throughout the settlement. The landscaping areas within the island were left entirely to the use of those living in the residences, and it was thought that the landscaping arrangements made to overcome the elevation differences on the land would bring the size of the intermediate spaces closer to human scale.

 

As the issue of resilience becomes increasingly important, it becomes important to increase social resilience in these types of residential settlements and to create opportunities that will increase creativity and the culture of coexistence in residential settlements, which are the smallest collective living units. For this purpose, areas where common activities, workshops and meetings can be held have been produced in the design, which will enable the development of neighborly relations and sharing habits among the residents of the settlement.

 

The project aims to achieve a cost-free, humble and simple façade approach. By keeping the material palette to a minimum, natural stone cladding was recommended on the ground floor level, and ready-made patina plaster consisting of 2 main colors was recommended on the upper floors. While designing spacious balcony areas, the bay window humor was reinterpreted in a different way, adding depth and liveliness to the facades. The occasional evacuations at the last floor level not only break the monotony but also contribute to the production of shaded common open spaces at these elevations.