The proposal for the Casablanca Sustainable Market Square competition by Nikolova/Aarsø (N/A) brings together the economic, ecological, cultural, and social aspects of sustainability together. The architects do so with the interplay of medieval Islamic design tradition and contemporary advanced building technology. The architectural concept is developed through the use of the girih tiles as a constantly present design method that elevates its purpose from pure ornamentation to a method of developing architectural composition, spatial organization, structural elements, integration of environmental sustainable technology and strategies, to the planning of flow of people. More images and architects’ description after the break.
Until recently, the general understanding of the complex Islamic tradition of geometric star-and-polygon patterns found in ornamentation of the medieval Islamic world was believed to be designed, using merely a straightedge and a compass to generate the zigzagging lines. Recent scientific studies have found out that the generation of these patterns was far more mathematically advanced, and that it was most likely based on a decagonal and quasi-crystalline mathematical understanding, through a method named girih tiles. This advanced mathematical understanding in the medieval Islamic world is used as the foundation in developing the architectural concept, ensuring a strong link and preservation of its cultural context and tradition, and centuries later, taking part in pushing the advancement of this design further one more time.
