The Great Kyz Kala is an awe-inspiring and dramatic mud-brick structure. It comprises a rectangular earth platform with sloping sides containing the lower-storey rooms. The massive corrugated external walls raise dramatically form the mound and enclose the rooms of the upper storey and parapet.

Enough of the interior survives to suggest at least 16 rooms built around a central space. Each corrugation is half-octagonal with a diameter of 1.3 metres, rising from a pointed base to form a pointed top.

This is an architecture ideally suited to a hot, arid climate, with life based around a shady central space, protected form the extremes of weather by thick enclosing mud-brick walls. The whole of Merv has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.