LE MERIDIEN HOTEL

The building is located in the sloping Etiler area, near the toll booths of the TEM Highway and the Fatih Sultan Mehmet Bridge. Etiler is one of the relatively new districts of İstanbul. Whatever their function is, -either residential or office buildings, even more recreational ones- the buildings in the neighborhood substantially does not differentiate from each other, without the exception of some new examples. Variability of the topography and the perceptions of perspective that differentiate in every points, nearly paste the buildings onto each other and create identical “organic masses”.

The main input of the design was the search of a mass, that will change surrounding building scale as an advantage of the building regulations, will not go against that above-mentioned homogenous context, on the contrary will include that context by reinterpreting and will not be estranged to its location. In order to prevent the compactness caused by being multistorey, the vertical fragmentation of the mass was proposed to simplify the relationship between the mass and surrounding building environment.

Three masses, having approximately the scale of surrounding buildings, were separated from each other vertically and large terrace gardens were created in-between. In common with the other parts of the city, this attack which even more liberalizes the buildings from each other, strengthened the dialogue of the building with its location as a reference to environmental texture. Exterior surfaces of the masses were differentiated in such a way that increases the effects of this separation. Terrace gardens planted intensively and social spaces open to these gardens were aimed to be usage examples being alternatives to crowded lifestyle at the city center.