An exhibition taking place in The Sacré Coeur cathedral of Casablanca from November 4 – November 26, Learning from Casablanca is a representation of the result of an architectural comparative research in the field of housing and urbanism. In the context of the 5th African Perspective Conference, AAMatters in collaboration with Casamemoire has initiated this exposition with hopes that looking again at Casablanca might open new perspectives to the complex problems of modernist neighborhoods being demolished to make way for new development projects. More information on the event after the break.
Casablanca served as modernist laboratory for European architects to experiment with new concepts for dwelling environments. In the Netherlands, however, the building according to modernist principles has resulted in the creation of problematic areas, with high migration and criminality rates. The original plan of the neighbourhoods was to create dwellings on a grid of 8 times 8 meter. During the past fifty years inhabitants took over the role of architects and built themselves extensions to the original plan within this grid. The local saying ‘Every Moroccan is an architect’ is practiced here to the fullest.
