Project

West to the walls, South to the Majorelle.

Project for Bab Doukkala area in Marrakech

Year

2018

Course

Landscape Architecture Studio II

Location

Marrakech, Morocco

Team

w/ Panteha Karimi and Giulia Sicignano

The city walls that surrounding old medina represent a very strong sign within the urban landscape of Marrakech. It is a trackable and continuous limit that encloses the original part of the city. The walls with their gates, or Bab, stand as an element of interaction and, together, separation, clearly marking the boundary between two worlds: the dense and compact medina and the western Ville Nouvelle. The area of ​​Bab Doukkala, near the ancient gate, and a directly neighbouring interstitial block, a large urban void within the new city, represent the occasion to rethink a portion of the city outside the walls where the present project is here an alternative to a recent international competition of ideas.

The direct experience and observation of the main dynamics that animate the city of Marrakech have been crucial to complete the knowledge of the city as a whole. In particular, operating near one of the neuralgic nodes of the city, close to the historical walls and to Bab Doukkala gate as one of the most important urban passages entering the medina, a first operation was to examine in depth the element of urban walls: behaviors and human activities that create the space in its proximity. Situations often observed in the Bab Doukkala area where we find, among all, a use of the walls as an informal market place. A use that is traditionally and specifically located near the gates exactly for their condition of passage and exit from the city. It represents a system of trade parallel to souk, the covered market typical of Islamic cities, which spreads widely in the shadow of the wall and official urban planning.

The design strategy, starting from the landscape enhancement of the system of historic walls, integrates a conservative approach towards some pre-existing elements in a perspective of positive enhancement of the existing heritage and preservation of the authenticity of the landscape, together with an adaptation and a reorganization of the current uses of space. The large existing palm grove, image of sacred landscape for Muslims which prohibition of destruction, is maintained, as well as the monument of the Seven Saints with a strong axis perpendicular to qiblah. The latter defines two areas, a more natural one in the north, where a botanical path of Mediterranean plants is introduced, and a more anthropic one in the south, characterized by a new geometric rule: the predominant inclination of qiblah. The area offers places of commerce and contemplation: they embody different experiences for the community and suggest other uses, such as places of association and human relationship.

The new market area has new points of aggregation achieved through the paving that follows the inclination of the qiblah. The central square has a fixed coverage that suggests uses that are not purely commercial, as a place of association and human relationship. The market, even with a geometric system, maintains its traditional flexible character.

The existing palm grove in the north has been mantained of earth and enhanced, making it at the same time completely walkable, with the only addition of some marked paths, of a soft and free line: on these a botanical path is designed with an organic shape, which becomes the natural extension of the tracks, characterized by the presence of different essences of cactus.

A second area of intervention concerns, instead, an adjacent interstitial block as a large urban void waiting for a functional programme. Inside no traces of connection between neighbouring blocks are traced; the limits of the block are instead a caesura and a limit that can not be crossed. The design strategy recalls here an important concept of the Islamic tradition, the enclosure, transferred to the urban system: on the edge the scale of the building compares with the height of the adjacent buildings, creating at the same time an enclosure to protect the internal landscape where the reference scale is that of the medium-small city, closer and more "human", where small open spaces and proximity between buildings guarantee a comfortable internal microclimate suitable for Moroccan conditions. The big urban void thus becomes the destination for various mainly public functions useful to the community. First of all the new location for the Faculty of Architecture of Marrakech (ENA), in the core of the system, and an Academic Garden focused on the theme of agriculture and cultivation techniques, to completion to the formative programme of the School of Arts and Crafts, both with different residences for students and administrative apparatus, together with open spaces, both ludic and academic.