Southwest Asia and North Africa: The Latest Architecture and News

Foster + Partners, in collaboration with Dar Al-Handasah, has revealed the master plan for Al Najd Agricultural City in Dhofar, southern Oman. Covering approximately 54 million square feet, the development is conceived as a self-sustaining agricultural and urban settlement designed to respond to the region's environmental conditions and agricultural landscape. Commissioned by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Planning and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, and Water Resources, the project forms part of the objectives outlined in Oman Vision 2040, which seeks to strengthen food security, diversify the national economy, and support sustainable development initiatives.

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Architecture often speaks about ecological design as though it were a recent discovery. Biodiversity corridors, regenerative landscapes, sponge cities, and more-than-human urbanism are presented as emerging responses to contemporary environmental crises. Across India and the SWANA region, landscapes shaped through religious practice have long organized relationships between people, water, vegetation, and animals. Long before ecological performance became a design metric, temple tanks stored monsoon water, sacred groves protected biodiversity, and oasis settlements sustained life in some of the world's most arid environments. Few of these places emerged from explicit environmental agendas. They emerged through cultural and spiritual practices. Their environmental logic remains highly relevant today. Many of the conditions now discussed through more-than-human design have existed for centuries within landscapes architects rarely study as ecological infrastructure.

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Architecture continues to draw cities as though humans occupy them alone. Plans trace circulation routes, zoning maps assign functions, and buildings are evaluated according to human comfort, safety, and efficiency. Walking through cities across India and Southwest Asia reveals something much more complex. Dogs sleep beneath market stalls, monkeys move across rooftops, birds nest in temple towers and mosque façades, and insects pollinate urban landscapes hidden in plain sight. These species are woven into daily urban life as consistently as human occupants. Streets, courtyards, roofs, drainage systems, markets, and vacant lots are already occupied by multiple species simultaneously. Architectural thinking has been slower to account for this reality.

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