Skip to Main Content

Veiling Architecture: Decoration of Domestic Buildings in Upper Egypt 1672-1950

Online ISBN:
9781617971099
Print ISBN:
9789774164873
Publisher:
American University in Cairo Press
Book

Veiling Architecture: Decoration of Domestic Buildings in Upper Egypt 1672-1950

Ahmed Abdel-Gawad
Ahmed Abdel-Gawad

Professor in the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine

Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt
Find on
Published online:
20 September 2012
Published in print:
9 June 2012
Online ISBN:
9781617971099
Print ISBN:
9789774164873
Publisher:
American University in Cairo Press

Abstract

In the Nile Valley and desert oases south of Cairo—Upper Egypt—surviving domestic buildings from the eighteenth, nineteenth, and early twentieth centuries demonstrate a unique and varied strand of traditional decoration. Intricate patterns in wood, iron, or plaster adorn doorways, balconies, windows, and rooflines in towns and villages throughout the region. One of the most distinctive cultural features of these traditional homes is the decorated wooden balcony-screen—with jigsaw-cut patterns often based on creative repetitions, inversions, and mirrorings of the Arabic letter waw—which was designed to veil the residents from public view while allowing them to take the air and watch the outside world go by. Here, Ahmed Abdel-Gawad presents a wide range of these exuberant and largely unknown designs, in both photographs and detailed architectural drawings, for the use and appreciation of designers, decorators, artists, and lovers of vernacular architecture.

Contents
Close
This Feature Is Available To Subscribers Only

Sign In or Create an Account

Close

This PDF is available to Subscribers Only

View Article Abstract & Purchase Options

For full access to this pdf, sign in to an existing account, or purchase an annual subscription.

Close