İzmit

İzmit

İzmit Clock Tower, also known as Kocaeli Clock Tower,[1] is a clock tower in İzmit, the center of Kocaeli. It is among the symbols of both the province and the city.

The construction of the 34th Ottoman Sultan Abdülhamid II's clock tower was started by Izmit Municipality following the initiative of the Izmit Mutasarrıfliği, in order to commemorate the 25th anniversary of his accession to the throne. The implementation of the project created by Architect Vedat (Tek) was carried out by Mihran Azaryan. On September 1, 1900, the foundation of the tower was laid, and although it was planned to be completed on the same day the following year, the process was delayed and in September 1902, the tower, which was not completely completed, was inaugurated.

The Izmit Clock Tower, a building in the style of Neoclassical Ottoman architecture in accordance with the First National Architecture Movement, uses Neoclassical and Islamic architectural details. The tower consists of two square prisms, a single-story pedestal and a three-story body. There is a marble fountain on three facades of the pedestal part. There are windows in the body of the building, which has a viewing balcony on the second floor. The fourth floor of the tower, which has different ornaments on each floor, has a clock on each of its four facades. The roof of the building has a pyramidal cone shape.