There is an ongoing discourse that leads to the distinction between the urban context of old middle eastern cities and the modern urban fabric. Reading an article entitled "Adapting Design Principles of Traditional Courtyard Housing for Future Urban Design" which inspired me to write this post. In this post, I'll focus on the differences between the two models of urban design. The points are summarized from the research above, thus for more detail you can read the article on the researchgate. Traditional Courtyard Urban ContextFirstly, the urban model of traditional cities of the middle east w ..read more

The Erbil City Located in the northern part of Iraq, Erbil city is the largest city in the autonomous Kurdistan region governed by Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). With 879000 inhabitants (September 2017) and stable security conditions, the city is one of the most significant, political, cultural and commercial centers of Iraq. The predominant climate of Erbil is a Mediterranean climate, distinctive by its cold, wet winters and hot and dry summers. Since 2003, and the collapse of the previous regime, the city enjoyed a period of economic progress, due to openness to the global community af ..read more