A Weekly Dose of Architecture Books

Egypt's Desert Dreams: Development or Disaster? David Sims AUC Press , September 2018 (New Edition) Paperback | 6 x 9 inches | 486 pages | 100 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-9774168574 | $29.95 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : Egypt has placed its hopes on developing its vast and empty deserts as the ultimate solution to the country’s problems. New cities, new farms, new industrial zones, new tourism resorts, and new development corridors, all have been promoted for over half a century to create a modern Egypt and to pull tens of millions of people away from the increasingly crowded Nile Valley into the desert hinterland. The results, in spite of colossal expenditures and ever-grander government pronouncements, have been meager at best, and today Egypt’s desert is littered with stalled schemes, abandoned projects, and forlorn dreams. It also remains stubbornly uninhabited. Egypt’s Desert Dreams is the first attempt of its kind to look at Egypt’s desert development in its en...

Cairo since 1900: An Architectural Guide Mohamed Elshahed AUC Press , December 2019 Flexicover | 5-1/2 x 7-1/2 inches | 410 pages | 330 illustrations | English | ISBN: 978-9774168697 | $39.95 PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION : The city of a thousand minarets is also the city of eclectic modern constructions, turn-of-the-century revivalism and romanticism, concrete expressionism, and modernist design. Yet while much has been published on Cairo’s ancient, medieval, and early-modern architectural heritage, the city’s modern architecture has to date not received the attention it deserves. Cairo since 1900: An Architectural Guide is the first comprehensive architectural guide to the constructions that have shaped and continue to shape the Egyptian capital since the early twentieth century. From the sleek apartment tower for Inji Zada in Ghamra designed by Antoine Selim Nahas in 1937, to the city’s many examples of experimental church architecture, and visible landmarks such as the Mugamma a...