Bab Ezzouar, Algiers, Algeria

Role: Architecture

Bab Ezzouar, meaning ‘gateway for travellers’; is a complex mixed use featuring a five star business hotel which acts as a portal or doorway to the glorious city of Algiers.

This multifaceted scheme comprises a 300 bed luxury hotel with serviced apartments, convention centre, shopping mall and retail plazas, exclusive residential apartments and penthouses, cultural centre and ancillary entertainment facilities such as restaurants, cafés, sports and wellness centre, amongst others.

Drawing on the traditional planning principles of Arabian architecture with specific focus on passive design strategies - interconnecting courtyards lined with water channels, intricate rectilinear geometries, micro-climatically receptive use of wooden screens or mashrabeya, narrow shaded corridors, and wind catching niches in solid volumes - the proposal celebrates a rich and sensitive heritage with contemporary inflections and state of the art technology.