Amazing urbanism
Surrounding the city for some ten kilometers, Marrakech's walls are a masterpiece of earthen architecture. Made of glowing adobe, they are pierced by 10 monumental gates (bab) that bear witness to an astonishing blend of military engineering and decorative art. Take a look at the famous Bab Agnaou, with its superimposition of different arches (horseshoe, broken, semicircular) creating an effect of movement reinforced by the elegant kufic elements sculpted in the red and green sandstone framing it. These walls protect the medina, a Unesco World Heritage site and masterpiece of Arab urban planning, with its labyrinthine alleys leading to the city's landmark buildings. There are, of course, the souks, with their wooden, reed and palm-tree wainscoting to protect the inhabitants from the harshness of the sun, and their stalls cleverly arranged by trade. Further on, beautiful vaulted or corbelled passageways lead you to a square adorned with a fountain with superb decorations of carved wood, stalactite arches or colored ceramics, such as the Fontaine Mouassine, whose rustling water echoes the muffled sounds coming from the baths and hammams, you'll recognize them by their domes, often pierced by star-shaped openings that allow steam to escape, and above all by their tadelakt walls, a coating made from lime tinted with natural pigments and polished with pebbles to give it a smooth, shiny, stone-like appearance, and designed to absorb moisture from the walls. Hammams El-Bacha and Bab-Doukkala are two fine examples. Further arched passages lead to the fondouks, or warehouse-hotels, where the first floor is occupied by a boutique and the1st floor by a gallery serving the rooms. Marrakech boasts almost a hundred of them. But the city is best known for its legendary riads. Behind imposing doors elegantly decorated with wrought iron and carved woodwork, paintings and impressive copper nails, and blind walls, a unique and intimate universe is revealed. Everything takes place inside, around a garden divided into 4 parterres by 2 paths paved with zellige (small fragments of ceramics of various colors juxtaposed to form decorative motifs and fixed with mortar) which intersect around a basin or fountain. This oasis of freshness is bordered by galleries serving the various rooms of the house. It is this garden that distinguishes riads from dars, simple one-storey or two-storey houses built around an open inner courtyard, also in adobe brick. The roofs of these dwellings are often terraced, and their juxtaposition creates a kind of second suspended city. Alongside this bustling medina lies another important district, the mellah or old Jewish quarter, which can be recognized by its tall mud-brick buildings adorned with wrought-iron balconies.
Splendors of Islam
In the heart of its medina, Marrakech is home to true treasures of Islamic architecture, starting with the famous Koutoubia, one of the largest mosques in the Muslim West. The first mosque built by the Almoravids was judged to be misdirected towards Mecca by their successors the Almohads. The latter decided to build a new mosque next to this "mistake", identical in every way to its model. If the two buildings cohabited for some time, the first mosque was eventually destroyed ... only its foundations remain. But the second and current Koutoubia, it, impresses by its volumes and dimensions: 16 identical parallel naves and 1 median nave wider ... amazing! But with the abundant ornamentation dear to the Almoravids, and that one can still observe in the minbar (pulpit for the preachings) with its thousands of pieces of cedar inlaid with silver and decorated with carved calligraphic motifs and sumptuous elements of marquetry, the Almohads preferred a less "extravagant" style, but still made an important place for the decoration, as shown by the 11 domes with stalactites (or muqarnas) and the capitals and frames molded and decorated with geometric, floral or calligraphic motifs. The flagship element of the Koutoubia is of course its minaret, a real sentinel of the desert that watches over the city from the top of its 77 m, and that we can recognize by the 4 spheres(jammour) of decreasing size and covered, it is said, with the gold of the jewels of the wife of Sultan Yacoub el-Mansour. A common point that it shares with the minaret of another superb mosque of the city: the Mosque of the Kasbah, often nicknamed "the mosque of golden apples "! The tombs and mausoleums are among the other splendors of Islam, starting with the Koubba el-Barudiyne, the only large intact vestige of the Almoravid period. A kubba is characterized by a dome roof. See here how the dome is elegantly ribbed. Built in stone and brick, this kubba also impresses by its rich decoration made of rosettes, various arcatures and, inside, beautiful sculpted marbles. A sumptuousness of the decoration which contrasts with the sobriety of the marabouts, the modest mausoleums of the great saints of the city and which are most often characterized by simple cubic volumes. This magnificence does not equal that of the incredible tombs erected by the Saadian dynasty. Delicacy of decoration, harmony and purity of lines characterize these masterpieces of funerary art, of which one can admire the room with 12 Carrara marble columns supporting a golden cedar dome or the room with the mihrab, a niche indicating Mecca, flanked here by beautiful grey marble columns. Moulay Ismaïl was so impressed by these tombs that he decided to preserve them... but he took care to enclose them in high walls! Another flagship building of Islamic architecture: the medersa or Koranic school. The Ben Youssef Medersa in Marrakech is undoubtedly one of the most famous in the country. The jewel of the school is its central courtyard decorated with a large white marble basin and lined with pillars forming an elegant portico. Friezes, brackets and green glazed tiles crown the facades, which are themselves pierced with carved cedar wood doors. The haram, the teaching and prayer room, is covered by a dome with a pyramidal roof of green tiles. On the first floor, the galleries are closed by beautiful wooden balustrades reminiscent of moucharabiehs and ensure the privacy of the students. In general, the spaces and volumes have been thought out with precision in order to allow ventilation and insulation, while maintaining a balanced exposure to light. In addition to this, there is a rich decoration made of polychrome ceramics, marquetry and sculpted stucco and plasterwork. An enchantment!
Gardens and palaces
Marrakech is also famous for its many gardens, the most famous of which, the Agdals, are still irrigated today by an ingenious system set up by the Almoravids. Called khettara, this system is composed of underground canals punctuated by wells allowing the water from springs and groundwater to be drained towards the oases, and of accumulation basins linked to a network of seguias or open-air gutters distributing the water towards the fields and gardens. It is this system that allows the city to be draped in such a luxuriant vegetation. Sumptuous gardens often go hand in hand with magnificent royal palaces, such as the famous Bahia Palace with its incredible painted, gilded and inlaid wooden ceilings and its large courtyard of honor paved with marble and adorned with zelliges, a masterpiece of Hispano-Moorish architecture; or Dar Si Said with its door and window jambs adorned with inlays, carvings and painted geometric motifs. These two 19th century palaces are precious witnesses of the know-how of the maalem, the famous Moroccan craftsmen. Of the legendary El-Badi Palace, nicknamed "the Incomparable", whose construction in the sixteenth century required the work of hundreds of craftsmen from Black Africa, Europe and even India and which could boast 360 rooms decorated with the finest materials, there is little left. Moulay Ismaïl literally stripped the palace of its marble, onyx, gold, ivory and precious woods to build the palaces of Meknes, his new fiefdom!
Contemporary influences
Created under the French Protectorate, the Guéliz district takes its name from the sandstone quarried in the surrounding hills. Conceived by Henri Prost, General Lyautey's architect, this "new town" is based on the codes of European urban planning, with an orderly grid layout of imposing thoroughfares, such as Avenue Mohammed V in this case. Banks, government offices and hotels clustered here, as did expatriate communities and wealthy families, who had elegant villas built, oscillating between neo-classical and neo-Moorish styles in particular, and the modernity of the Art Deco style, with its simple volumes and clean lines. A landmark shrouded in an almost mystical aura, the Jardin Majorelle is home to Louis Majorelle's large workshop, with its pergolas and arbors covered in a piercing blue. Since 2017, the garden has been home to a new landmark: the Yves Saint-Laurent Museum (the couturier bought the garden and the villa!) designed by Studio KO. Admire its facade, made up of an assembly of brick-clad cubes which, under the effect of light and a surprising play of textures, create a "lace" effect. Numerous other museums and cultural venues have taken over the restored fondouks. Other fine contemporary buildings include the city's new airport, with its white volumes, geometric and honeycomb patterns, large dome, walkways and pedestrian esplanades, reminiscent of the urban planning typical of Arab cities. Highly sought-after, riads are subject to transformation and restoration, such as Villa Makassar, which takes its name from a precious wood and has been entirely redesigned in the spirit of... Art Deco! A lovely dialogue between eras. In the heart of the Palmeraie, the Palais Aziza combines contemporary luxury with the use of traditional materials: zellige and tadelakt for the walls; bejmat (rectangular or square glazed or natural baked clay tiles) for the floors; woodwork and marquetry of local species, roof covered with karmoudes, traditional green tiles... all echoes of the city's traditional residences.
Berber treasures
Around Marrakech, a completely different type of architecture awaits you. The Berber tradition can be seen in the buildings, most often fortified, of rather austere appearance, generally square in plan, with only a few decorative elements... here, the power and sobriety of this rich earthen architecture are self-sufficient! Not to be missed: the fortified villages of the High Atlas with their ighrems or communal granaries, the myriad of villages (douar) with adobe houses dotting the plateaus of the Ourika Valley and, of course, the Kasbah of Telouet. A fortress as much as a seigneurial residence, the kasbah reveals the strength of adobe or baked brick constructions and the power of their silhouette, which resembles a tiered pyramid with only a few openings, further reinforcing their austere character. In Telouet, the crenellated walls of the kasbah, flanked by square bastions, shelter the ruins of what was once a 19th-century pleasure residence with columns and walls decorated with zellige and chiselled stucco, and painted or stalactite ceilings, in the purest tradition of Hispano-Moorish architecture. Ouirgane also features adobe houses with flat roofs made of logs and branches covered with earth, an ingenious system for insulation and ventilation.
Getaway to Essaouira
Essaouira is a unique city resulting from an astonishing mix of French-style urban planning and Arab traditions. In the 18th century, the Alaouite Sultan Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdallah commissioned the French engineer (and prisoner!) Théodore Cornut to draw up the plan for a new city. The latter will develop according to a rectilinear layout where streets and avenues intersect with a width never seen before in these regions, while being protected by impressive ramparts inspired by Vauban models. This is how Mogador became Essaouira, "the well designed"! Among the key elements of these fortifications, don't miss the skala of the port, a large 200-meter long artillery platform surrounded by crenellated walls, whose casemates are now occupied by many artists; and the Navy Gate surmounted by a pediment resting on two fluted columns and framed by two watchtowers, and connected to the skala by a bridge with stubby piers and a crenellated parapet. These powerful ramparts protect the medina of the city, classified as World Heritage by UNESCO. Lively souks, finely sculpted ashlar portals with zellige arcades opening onto the inner courtyards of the beautiful urban residences with whitewashed walls and deep blue door and window frames, are all witnesses to the city's Arab identity. Don't miss the beautiful Moulay el-Hassan square and its Moroccan-Portuguese style... yes, the Portuguese also put their mark on the city, as shown by the remains of the Royal Castle built in 1506! Having become a popular destination, Essaouira is the object of tourist and real estate projects that worry the defenders of its rich heritage... fortunately, some people choose to respect the place, like the future City of Arts and Culture, which will soon be built and whose curves reminding the flight of seagulls on the city were designed by the famous Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer!
