The building, which is the most important and magnificent Ottoman work of Mustafapaşa, was built by Mısırlı Mehmet Şakir Pasha in 1899 (Hijri 1316), according to its inscription. The madrasa later hosted many functions such as a mansion, a military unit and a carpet store. Today, it continues its original educational function by serving as the educational building of Cappadocia University.
The two-storey building has an asymmetrical and open courtyard plan scheme. Since there is a high elevation difference between the east and west of the madrasah, the building was built in stages. The elevation decreases from east to west, thus creating a two-storey section. It is passed into the open courtyard through the monumental portal on the western façade of the madrasa. The courtyard is surrounded by six arched porticoes extending along the north and east facades. Madrasa rooms open to this porticoed area.
The crown gate of the madrasa, which had a rare magnificence at the time it was built, is a masterpiece of stone carving masters in the region. The stone-made stepped arches, colonnades and the entire wall surface around the double-winged wooden door, which has floral relief motifs, are decorated with floral and geometric reliefs. Even the inscription on the door was handled and designed independently within the decoration program.
The colonnades with Corinthian style capitals, on which one of the arches on the portal sits, have a functional as well as an aesthetic aspect. The fact that these columns in the form of rotating columns rotate gives information about the balance and durability of the structure.
The decoration program of the crown gate of Mehmet Şakir Pasha Madrasa, which follows the plan scheme of the 16th century madrasahs like other Late Period Ottoman Madrasahs, carries traces of the decoration features of the 19th century. On the one hand, here is an ostentatious sense of decoration like the examples from the Seljuk and Principality periods; On the other hand, baroque-rococo influence is seen in terms of form, unlike their decorative features. The general decoration program of the building is simple, except for this monumental crown gate. The Ottoman tughra engraved in marble on the front of the building bears great resemblance to the early 20th century tughras.
