Volume 22, Number 20 · December 11, 1975
Joy in Mudville
By Moshe Safdie
Architecture for the Poor
by Hassan Fathy
University of Chicago Press, 233, 132 illustrations pp., $5.95 (paperback to be published early 1976) (paper)
When I leafed through Architecture for the Poor by the Egyptian architect Hassan Fathy, I was at first struck by the illustrations showing domed houses in quaint streets and squares, an arcaded white mosque and market place, arches, vaults, domes, trellises, and massive masonry walls. I saw a beautiful village that seemed to be a superb example of the 'indigenous vernacular architecture' built for hundreds of years along the plains of the Mediterranean in North Africa or the Middle East. But when I started to read the captions, I was not sure whether what I was looking at was ten years old or five hundred. The text refers to 'the new village of Gourna,' and some of the accompanying photographs suggested that I might be looking at recent buildings. Could this really be an entirely new environment, a single project built from one plan? I soon discovered that Hassan Fathy had designed and built this village in the late 1940s as a prototypical mud brick housing project offering a solution for rural housing in Egypt.
Review, 2810 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |