House in Al-Mansour

Notes

This house was adversely affected from the change in the urban laws of the area. Right after its inauguration, these laws transformed the calm and low-rise neighborhood into a fast and turbulent high-rise district. Thus, the house’s contextuality and connectedness to the surroundings got severely compromised, especially with the adjacent high wall of the Rafidan Bank Building, designed by Rifat Chadirji. As a result, the currently abandoned house appears to be an alienating and alienated object.

The first eye-catching feature in the building is the artisanal value conveyed in the brick cladding, which is testimonial to the architect’s skills and knowledge in the physical and mechanical attributes of the material. An imposing horizontal band, built in reinforced concrete, floats and wraps along the building’s periphery. The dome right above the living room plays two roles: it signals the entrance point of the house and brings finality to the curved wall defining one edge of the building.
 

Sources

Khaled al-Sultany, Study on Representations of Architectural modernity in Iraq, Amman: Adib Books, 2021, p. 364-371.

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