Hassan Fathy ( arz, حسن فتحي; March 23, 1900 – November 30, 1989) was a noted
Egyptian architect who pioneered
appropriate technology
Appropriate technology is a movement (and its manifestations) encompassing technological choice and application that is small-scale, affordable by locals, decentralized, labor-intensive, energy-efficient, environmentally sustainable, and loca ...
for building in
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...
, especially by working to reestablish the use of
adobe
Adobe ( ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for '' mudbrick''. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is used to refer to any kind of ...
and traditional mud construction as opposed to
western
Western may refer to:
Places
*Western, Nebraska, a village in the US
*Western, New York, a town in the US
*Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia
*Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia
*Western world, countries that id ...
building design
Building design refers to the broadly based architectural, engineering and technical applications to the design of buildings. All building projects require the services of a building designer, typically a licensed architect. Smaller, less complica ...
s, material configurations, and lay-outs. Fathy was recognized with the
Aga Khan Chairman's Award for Architecture in 1980.
In 2017, Google celebrated Fathy with a
Google Doodle
A Google Doodle is a special, temporary alteration of the logo on Google's homepages intended to commemorate holidays, events, achievements, and notable historical figures. The first Google Doodle honored the 1998 edition of the long-running an ...
for "pioneering new methods
n_architecture.html" ;"title="architecture.html" ;"title="n architecture">n architecture">architecture.html" ;"title="n architecture">n architecture respecting tradition [Egyptian heritage and tradition], and valuing all walks of life".
Personal life
Hassan Fathy was born in Alexandria to a Middle Class Upper Egyptian family. He studied and trained as an
architect
An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...
in
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning the North Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via a land bridg ...
, graduating in 1926 from the King Fuad University (now
Cairo University
Cairo University ( ar, جامعة القاهرة, Jāmi‘a al-Qāhira), also known as the Egyptian University from 1908 to 1940, and King Fuad I University and Fu'ād al-Awwal University from 1940 to 1952, is Egypt's premier public university ...
). Fathy married Aziza Hassanein, sister of
Ahmed Hassanein. He was influenced by Upper Egyptian and simple rural architecture, he designed a villa with the southern style for his wife along the
Nile
The Nile, , Bohairic , lg, Kiira , Nobiin: Áman Dawū is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa and has historically been considered the longest riv ...
in
Maadi
Maadi ( ar, المعادي / transliterated: ) is a leafy suburban district south of Cairo, Egypt, on the east bank of the Nile about upriver from downtown Cairo. The Nile at Maadi is parallelled by the Corniche, a waterfront promenade a ...
, which was later destroyed to make way for the new
corniche
A corniche is a road on the side of a cliff or mountain, with the ground rising on one side and falling away on the other. The word has been absorbed into English from the French term ' or "road on a ledge", originally derived from the Itali ...
. He also designed her brother's mausoleum (1947), along Salah Salem, in
Neo-Mamluk style.
Career
Hassan Fathy was a
cosmopolitan
Cosmopolitan may refer to:
Food and drink
* Cosmopolitan (cocktail), also known as a "Cosmo"
History
* Rootless cosmopolitan, a Soviet derogatory epithet during Joseph Stalin's anti-Semitic campaign of 1949–1953
Hotels and resorts
* Cosmopoli ...
trilingual professor-engineer-architect, amateur musician, dramatist, and inventor. He designed nearly 160 separate projects, from modest country retreats to fully planned communities with
police
The police are a Law enforcement organization, constituted body of Law enforcement officer, persons empowered by a State (polity), state, with the aim to law enforcement, enforce the law, to ensure the safety, health and possessions of citize ...
,
fire
Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material (the fuel) in the exothermic chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction products.
At a certain point in the combustion reaction, called the ignition point, flames ...
, and
medical services, markets, schools, theatres, and places for worship and recreation. These communities included many functional buildings such as laundry facilities, ovens, and wells. He utilized ancient design methods and materials, as well as knowledge of the rural Egyptian economic situation with a wide knowledge of ancient architectural and town design techniques. He trained local inhabitants to make their own materials and build their own buildings.
Early career/New Gourna
He began teaching at the College of Fine Arts in 1930 and designed his first adobe buildings in the late 1930s.
Fathy gained international critical acclaim for his involvement in the construction of
New Gourna
Kurna (also Gourna, Gurna, Qurna, Qurnah or Qurneh; ar, القرنة) are various spelling for a group of three closely related villages (New Qurna, Qurna and Sheikh ‘Adb el-Qurna) located on the West Bank of the River Nile opposite the moder ...
, located on
Luxor
Luxor ( ar, الأقصر, al-ʾuqṣur, lit=the palaces) is a modern city in Upper (southern) Egypt which includes the site of the Ancient Egyptian city of ''Thebes''.
Luxor has frequently been characterized as the "world's greatest open-a ...
's West Bank, built to resettle the village of
Gourna, which fell within the archaeological areas of the
Valley of the Kings
The Valley of the Kings ( ar, وادي الملوك ; Late Coptic: ), also known as the Valley of the Gates of the Kings ( ar, وادي أبوا الملوك ), is a valley in Egypt where, for a period of nearly 500 years from the 16th to 11th ...
and the
Valley of the Queens.
Fathy's plan devised groundbreaking approaches to economic, social, and aesthetic issues that typically impact the construction of low-cost housing.
With regard to the economic issues, Fathy noted that structural steel was not an apt choice for a poor country, and that even materials such as cement, timber, and glass did not make good economic sense. To address this issue, Fathy instead devised a plan that included the use of
appropriate technology
Appropriate technology is a movement (and its manifestations) encompassing technological choice and application that is small-scale, affordable by locals, decentralized, labor-intensive, energy-efficient, environmentally sustainable, and loca ...
, notably mud brick construction.
Noting that the traditional village, although afflicted with issues of overcrowding and poor sanitation was also an expression of “a living society in all its complexity,” Fathy strived to design New Gourna in a manner that addressed the social concerns, including attempting to consult directly with "every family in Gourna" and advocating for the involvement of
social ethnographers in the planning process. Despite this, inhabitants of the former village were not enthusiastic about relocating, which effectively cut them off from their existing livelihood of trading in archaeological finds.
With regard to aesthetic issues, Fathy placed emphasis on traditional
Nubian
Nubian may refer to:
*Something of, from, or related to Nubia, a region along the Nile river in Southern Egypt and northern Sudan.
*Nubian people
*Nubian languages
*Anglo-Nubian goat, a breed of goat
* Nubian ibex
* , several ships of the Britis ...
architectural designs which he observed in a 1941 trip to the region (enclosed courtyards; vaulted roofing), yielding what Fathy described as "spacious, lovely, clean, and harmonious houses." He also made use of traditional Nubian ornamental techniques (claustra, a form of mud
latticework
__NOTOC__
Latticework is an openwork framework consisting of a criss-crossed pattern of strips of building material, typically wood or metal. The design is created by crossing the strips to form a grid or weave.
Latticework may be functional &nda ...
), as well as
vernacular architecture
Vernacular architecture is building done outside any academic tradition, and without professional guidance. This category encompasses a wide range and variety of building types, with differing methods of construction, from around the world, bo ...
techniques of the Gourna region. Some critics have observed, however, that Fathy's project for Gourna is not a superlative example of how to prioritize vernacular architecture in an urban plan, given that the domed architecture Fathy championed is traditionally used for funerary architecture rather than residential or domestic spaces
Despite the effort, and also the proper issues he tackled while building New Gourna, through his publication,
Architecture for the Poor', he describes the "Gourna Experiment" as a failure. He mentions in
Architecture for the Poor, “''the Gourna experiment failed."
He further describes the sense of failure that due to the village not being completed and the construction being halted, the theory of mud brick construction was seen even more cranky and impractical. Despite the theory being completely lost, that there wasn't anyone that tried to find other practical ways of getting peasant houses built efficiently. There were more issues he came across, such as him stating "This is because no architect knows the real cost of building." Although he dives further into that thought, by speaking on how nobody realistically knows the price or cost, because we’re at the mercy of the economy. Despite the negative outlooks he had writing these books, he managed to make Gourna a community, and till this day is still preserved with only 40% of the original buildings being lost. It's still standing due to being placed on the
2010 World Monuments Watch, and UNESCO and World Monuments Fund joined forces.
Later career
In 1953 he returned to Cairo, heading the Architectural Section of the Faculty of Fine Arts in 1954.
Fathy's next major engagement was designing and supervising school construction for Egypt's
Ministry of Education
An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, and Ministry of Pub ...
.
Through his work of the years, and especially after New Gourna, he targeted bureaucracy being one of the leading reasons that the experiment failed, which influenced later actions such as in 1957, frustrated with
bureaucracy
The term bureaucracy () refers to a body of non-elected governing officials as well as to an administrative policy-making group. Historically, a bureaucracy was a government administration managed by departments staffed with non-elected offi ...
and convinced that buildings designed with traditional methods appropriate to the climate of the area would speak louder than words, he moved to
Athens
Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates a ...
to collaborate with international planners evolving the principles of
ekistical design under the direction of
Constantinos Apostolou Doxiadis
Constantinos A. Doxiadis (); also spelled Konstantinos. (14 May 1913 – 28 June 1975), often cited as C. A. Doxiadis, was a Greek architect and urban planner. During the 1960s, he was the lead architect and planner of Islamabad, which was t ...
. He served as the advocate of traditional natural-energy solutions in major community projects for
Iraq
Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...
and
Pakistan
Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...
and undertook extended travel and research for the "Cities of the Future" program in
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
.
Returning to
Cairo
Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metr ...
in 1963, he moved to Darb al-Labbana, near the
Cairo Citadel
The Citadel of Cairo or Citadel of Saladin ( ar, قلعة صلاح الدين, Qalaʿat Salāḥ ad-Dīn) is a medieval Islamic-era fortification in Cairo, Egypt, built by Salah ad-Din (Saladin) and further developed by subsequent Egyptian rule ...
, where he lived and worked for the rest of his life. He also did public speaking and private consulting. He was a man with a riveting message in an era searching for alternatives in
fuel
A fuel is any material that can be made to react with other substances so that it releases energy as thermal energy or to be used for work. The concept was originally applied solely to those materials capable of releasing chemical energy b ...
, personal interactions, and economic supports.
He left his first major international position, at the
American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...
in Boston, in 1969 to complete multiple trips per year as a leading critical member of the architectural profession.
His participation in the first U.N.
Habitat
In ecology, the term habitat summarises the array of resources, physical and biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species habitat can be seen as the physical ...
conference in 1976 in
Vancouver
Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the city, up from 631,486 in 2016. ...
which was followed shortly by two events that significantly shaped the rest of his activities. He began to serve on the steering committee for the nascen
Aga Khan Award for Architectureand he founded and set guiding principles for his Institute of Appropriate Technology.
He was part in 1979 of a colloquium entitled in his honour 'Architecture for the Poor' in Corsica (France) Alzipratu.
In 1980, he was awarded the
Balzan Prize
The International Balzan Prize Foundation awards four annual monetary prizes to people or organizations who have made outstanding achievements in the fields of humanities, natural sciences, culture, as well as for endeavours for peace and the br ...
for Architecture and Urban Planning and the
Right Livelihood Award
The Right Livelihood Award is an international award to "honour and support those offering practical and exemplary answers to the most urgent challenges facing us today." The prize was established in 1980 by German-Swedish philanthropist Jakob vo ...
.
Fathy designed the mosque and madrasa, constructed with
adobe
Adobe ( ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for '' mudbrick''. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is used to refer to any kind of ...
, at
Dar al-Islam
In classical Islamic law, the major divisions are ''dar al-Islam'' (lit. territory of Islam/voluntary submission to God), denoting regions where Islamic law prevails, ''dar al-sulh'' (lit. territory of treaty) denoting non-Islamic lands which have ...
, an educational center near
Abiquiú, New Mexico
Abiquiú (, , Tewa: ; Northern Tiwa: ) is a census-designated place in Rio Arriba County, in northern New Mexico in the southwestern United States, about 53 miles (85 km) north of Santa Fe. As of 2010, the population was 231. Abiquiú' ...
, USA. The main buildings were completed in 1981, and Dar al-Islam opened in 1982.
Death
Hassan Fathy died on November 30th, 1989. He died in
Cairo
Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metr ...
, Egypt. He passed away peacefully in his home, and died of natural causes.
Legacy
Fathy has been called Egypt's best-known
architect
An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...
since
Imhotep
Imhotep (; egy, ỉỉ-m-ḥtp "(the one who) comes in peace"; fl. late 27th century BCE) was an Egyptian chancellor to the Pharaoh Djoser, possible architect of Djoser's step pyramid, and high priest of the sun god Ra at Heliopol ...
.
Fathy's New Gourna project was applauded in a popular British weekly in 1947 and soon after in a British professional journal; further articles were published in Spanish, French and in Dutch. Later, Fathy would author a book on the New Gourna project, initially published by Cairo's Ministry of Culture in a limited edition in 1969, entitled ''Gourna: A Tale of Two Villages''. In 1973 it was republished by the University of Chicago as ''Architecture for the Poor: An Experiment in Rural Egypt''.
A full appreciation of the importance of Fathy's contribution to world architecture became clear only as the twentieth century waned.
Climatic conditions,
public health
Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the det ...
considerations, and ancient
craft
A craft or trade is a pastime or an occupation that requires particular skills and knowledge of skilled work. In a historical sense, particularly the Middle Ages and earlier, the term is usually applied to people occupied in small scale pr ...
skills also affected his design decisions. Based on the structural massing of ancient buildings, Fathy incorporated dense brick walls and traditional courtyard forms to provide passive cooling. Fathy is also renowned for having revived the traditional
Nubian vault.
National Life Stories
National Life Stories is an independent charitable trust and limited company (registered as the ‘National Life Story Collection’) based within the British Library Oral History section, whose key focus and expertise is oral history fieldwork. S ...
conducted an oral history interview (C467/37) with Hassan Fathy in 1986 for its Architects Lives' collection held by the British Library.
Hassan Fathy made use of
windcatcher
A windcatcher, wind tower, or wind scoop ( ar, برجيل ; fa, بادگیر) is a traditional architectural element used to create cross ventilation and passive cooling in buildings. Windcatchers come in various designs: unidirectional, bi ...
s and other
passive cooling
Passive cooling is a building design approach that focuses on heat gain control and heat dissipation in a building in order to improve the indoor thermal comfort with low or no energy consumption. This approach works either by preventing heat from ...
and
passive ventilation methods from traditional architecture. He wrot
a bookon them.
Fathy is featured in the documentary ''Il ne suffit pas que dieu soit avec les pauvres'' (1978) by
Borhane Alaouié and Lotfi Thabet.
Collection
Hassan Fathy's entire archive which includes his architectural plans, photographs and documents is housed at th
Rare Books and Special Collections Libraryat the
American University in Cairo
The American University in Cairo (AUC; ar, الجامعة الأمريكية بالقاهرة, Al-Jāmi‘a al-’Amrīkiyya bi-l-Qāhira) is a private research university in Cairo, Egypt. The university offers American-style learning progra ...
.' The collection includes around 5000 architectural plans, 15,000 photographs and his correspondences, writings and other collected papers and materials.
Publications
Hassan Fathy has a number of publications. His first boo
''Architecture for the Poor''was initially published by the Egyptian Ministry of Culture in 1969 under the title ''Al-Gurna: A Tale of Two Villages.''
There is also a growing number of books about Hassan Fathy. The list includes:
* El-Wakil
''Hassan Fathy dans son temps'' Infolio, 2013 (edited volume)
* El-Wakil, L. 2018
''Hassan Fathy: an architectural life'' The American University in Cairo Press, New York; Cairo (edited volume)
* Damluji, S. and Bertini, V., 2018
''Hassan Fathy: Earth & Utopia'' London: Laurence King.
* Dávid, Dóra and Vasáros, Zsolt (2020)
Publications of the Office of the Hungarian Cultural Counsellor in Cairo 2018-2019 Current Research of the Hassan Fathy Survey Mission in Egypt.'' Project Report. Department of Industrial and Agricultural Building Design and Office of the Hungarian Cultural Counsellor in Cairo, Budapest and Cairo.
See also
*
Ramses Wissa Wassef
Ramses Wissa Wassef (1911–1974) was an Egyptian Coptic architect and professor of art and architecture at the College of Fine Arts in Cairo and founder of the Ramses Wissa Wassef Art Centre.
Biography
Ramses Wissa Wassef was born in Cairo. Hi ...
*
Laurie Baker
*
Geoffrey Bawa
Deshamanya Geoffrey Manning Bawa, FRIBA (23 July 1919 – 27 May 2003) was a Sri Lankan architect. He was among the most influential Asian architects of his generation.
Early life
Geoffrey Bawa was born in Colombo on 23 July 1919, the young ...
*
Muzharul Islam
*
Charles Correa
Charles Mark Correa (1 September 1930 – 16 June 2015) was an Indian architect and urban planner. Credited with the creation of modern architecture in post-Independent India, he was celebrated for his sensitivity to the needs of the urban p ...
*
Abdel-Wahed El-Wakil
Abdel-Wahed El-Wakil ( ar, عبد الواحد الوكيل, born 7 August 1943) is an Egyptian architect who designed over 15 mosques in Saudi Arabia and is considered by many as the foremost contemporary authority in Islamic architecture. For ...
*
Nayyar Ali Dada
Nayyar Ali Dada ( ur, نیر علی دادا) (born 11 November 1943) is a Pakistani architect.
*
Agha Khan Foundation
References
Bibliography
*
*
* Abdel-moniem El-Shorbagy, Hassan Fathy: The Power of Belief. Lambert Academic Publishing, Germany, 2017.
* Abdel-moniem El-Shorbagy, Hassan Fathy: The Language of Traditional Architecture. Lambert Academic Publishing, Germany, 2017.
Sources
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
* ''(free fulltext)''
Digital collection of Hassan Fathy's architectural drawingsFathy's the Father of Sustainable Architecture in the Middle EastBiography and images of Fathy's architecturePicture gallery from Hassan Fathy's project "New Baris" in Kharga Oasis, Egyptat Remains.se
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fathy, Hassan
1900 births
1989 deaths
20th-century Egyptian architects
Appropriate technology advocates
Architecture in Egypt
Cairo University alumni
Egyptian nationalists
Modernist architects
People from Alexandria
College of Fine Arts in Cairo faculty