{"id":357904,"date":"2025-12-19T08:23:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-19T08:23:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/357904\/"},"modified":"2025-12-19T08:23:14","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T08:23:14","slug":"beyond-the-giga-projects-a-new-generation-of-saudi-arabian-architects-is-getting-introspective","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/357904\/","title":{"rendered":"Beyond the Giga projects, a new generation of Saudi Arabian architects is getting introspective"},"content":{"rendered":"

The glimmering glass-and-metal skyscrapers jutting up around Riyadh\u2019s King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) feel like a declaration of intent. With Saudi Arabia starting to spend its vast oil wealth on architecture \u2013\u00a0much of it future infrastructure to accommodate the 150 million tourists a year that it wants to welcome by 2030 \u2013 cranes dot skylines from Jeddah and Diriyah to AlUla.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As the country opens to the outside world, design is becoming a greater part of national discourse (the Design & Architecture Commission was only created in 2020, part a Ministry of Culture that was established a mere two years earlier), and industry opportunities abound. This explains why Milan\u2019s international design fair, Salone del Mobile<\/a>, touched down in Riyadh last month. Located inside a partially open-air space in KAFD, turned a Salone shade of red for the occasion, it featured iconic pieces of \u201cmade in Italy\u201d furniture from Poltrona Frau<\/a> to Poliform<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"SaloneRed letter day: Salone del Mobile\u2019s \u201cRed in progress\u201d event (Image: Courtesy of Salone del Mobile)<\/p>\n

\"SaloneAhead of the curve: Inside Salone del Mobile\u2019s \u201cRed in progress\u201d (Image: Courtesy of Salone del Mobile)<\/p>\n

The three-day event, called \u201cRed in progress. Salone del Mobile. Milano meets Riyadh\u201d, set the scene ahead of a fully-fledged edition coming next year. The 38 Italian brands travelling with the delegation were hoping to make deals with local contacts to open Saudi retail outposts or furnish the interiors of new projects. But\u00a0a series of panel talks organised at the same time as design brands were fleshing out deals in a nearby business lounge gave a fascinating window into the shape-shifting design scene and what Saudis are thinking.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Saudi Arabia\u2019s emerging architectural voices<\/p>\n

Away from the attention-grabbing headlines about Giga projects and big-name firms, a crop of young Saudi architects and designers \u2013\u00a0many of whom have returned from stints abroad in the US, UK or even Spain \u2013 are getting introspective about the sort of future they want to help build.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Landscape designer Lulu Almana recently moved back after a six-year stint at Arup in London. While working on Saudi projects from there, she realised that she wasn\u2019t close enough. \u201cI had a growing desire to just be here and be playing a more direct, active role in designing these spaces and shaping the cities that we live in,\u201d she tells Monocle from KAFD. \u201cAs a designer, I felt like maybe this was the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

This year, Almana worked on Saudi Arabia\u2019s debut at the Milan Triennale, showcasing a project called \u201cMaghras: A Farm For Experimentation\u201d, co-curated with Sara Al Omran. About to start its second season of programming, Maghras is located on a farm in Al Ahsa, the oldest and largest oasis in the world, and mixes workshops, research, and talks from architects and designers as a way of looking at the changing landscape. In short, Maghras is deeply rooted in place \u2013\u00a0which is what Almana is looking to do for future projects as she gets stuck into \u201call of this soul-searching type of work\u201d.<\/p>\n

The designer is drawn to collaborate with communities to help regenerate public spaces. When Monocle meets her, she is only a few months into running her own practice but is already working on Rufaida Park in Dammam, in the eastern part of the country, which is due to open in mid-January. Looking to address the needs of an elder segment of the population, it includes native trees and medicinal plants, an outdoor gym and a tea-drinking area.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Since moving back, Almana says that she has had this strong desire to root herself \u201cin this next context\u201d. Part of that process is cataloguing what Saudi Arabia already has. \u201cWhat do we have that we haven\u2019t been paying enough attention to?\u201d she asks. She doesn\u2019t rule out taking road trips around the country to see what she can learn from certain landscapes. In truth, the seeds of her desire to catalogue started when she was in London and hired by the Architecture & Design Commission. She was tasked with creating a \u201cvery practical and process-based\u201d manual for landscape designers that makes them think about sustainability and cultural continuity, among other ideas, when approaching a new project. It\u2019s designed to be used in parallel with another new document called the King Salman Charter for Architecture and Urbanism, drawn up by the same commission. The latter has six core pillars, including liveability and authenticity, aimed at making designers ask themselves the right questions.<\/p>\n

\"LuluStanding out: Lulu Almana (Image: Ishaq Madan)<\/p>\n

\"TurkiDynamic duo: Turki (on left) and Abdulrahman Gazzaz of Bricklab<\/p>\n

Abdulrahman Gazzaz, who co-founded Jeddah\u2019s Bricklab alongside his brother, Turki, and spoke at a \u201cRed in progress\u201d talk about building in an extreme environment, is another architect looking to document what is happening around him. Part of his research has involved thinking about new ways to represent Saudi architecture \u2013\u00a0beyond the ubiquitous triangle motif that is inspired by ventilation windows on historic mud-hut structures. \u201cThere are so many different motifs to look at,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s just [about] trying to understand the banal and the mundane that you see in the city on a daily basis.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Bricklab\u2019sGreen oasis: Bricklab\u2019s Attach\u00e9 project (Image: Abdulrahman Bayashout\/BAYA Studio)<\/p>\n

\"TheFree rein: The Attach\u00e9 site was once a horse stable (Image: Abdulrahman Bayashout\/BAYA Studio)<\/p>\n

Gazzaz, who studied in Bristol in the UK, says that educational intuitions provide books on architecture from Germany or France but never Saudi Arabia. Which is why he set about creating a record through a book called Saudi Modern: Jeddah in Transition 1938-1964. Meticulous, research-led work like that has led to Bricklab focusing a large part of its energies on adaptive reuse projects \u2013 including Attach\u00e9, a redeveloped former stable in the capital\u2019s Diplomatic Quarter \u2013\u00a0although Gazzaz doesn\u2019t rule out working on new-builds, such as a recent project for the Ministry of Culture in Riyadh\u2019s Jax neighbourhood.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Shaping identity in a fast-changing built environment<\/p>\n

Thinking about big topics such as identity isn\u2019t always easy in a country that seems in a hurry to leap forward and where projects go up at a breakneck speed. For Abdullah Alazzaz, creative director at Azaz Architects, which was originally founded in 2017 by his sister, Shahad, there\u2019s a question of which historical moment you take as a starting point when searching for authenticity from your past. Alazzaz, who studied civil engineering in upstate New York and worked in finance in London before heading home, doesn\u2019t think these references need to exist for the sake of them. He\u2019s just happy to \u201cget a front-row seat\u201d on everything that is happening, working on everything from residential to Giga projects. \u201cIt\u2019s very rewarding to feel like we\u2019re shaping something for the future,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\"\"Sitting pretty: Adbullah Alazzaz (Image: Azaz Architects)<\/p>\n

\"BofiaShaping up: Bofia Restaurant (Image: Azaz Architects) <\/p>\n

As the country continues to evolve, so too does the architecture profession. When Alazzaz\u2019s sister started \u201cas a one-woman show\u201d, times were different \u2013\u00a0both economically and socially. Now, as more architecture departments and schools for women start to open, a whole new generation is set to emerge with a heightened interest in the built environment and ready to play an active role in Saudi Arabia\u2019s development. \u201cThere is a huge need in the market for architects \u2013\u00a0especially female ones,\u201d says Noura Ghabara, assistant professor in architecture at Jeddah\u2019s King Abdulaziz University, from a red bench-seat in KAFD. \u201cWe look at things differently. I am not saying one is better than the other but it\u2019s just about complementing each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ghabara, who gave a masterclass about reimagining the future of the built environment in which she constantly threw to the audience, believes \u2013\u00a0as you might expect given her academic position \u2013 that education is key as Saudi Arabia soul-searches for how it wants to develop. \u201cWe are realising that we can\u2019t have the answers now,\u201d she says. \u201cThis is something that will take time. But we have to lay the foundation for future generations.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRed in progress\u201d ran from 26 to 28 November. Look out for Monocle\u2019s report from Saudi Arabia in our \u2018Salone del Mobile\u2019 newspaper, published in April. The inaugural Salone del Mobile Riyadh will take place in November 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The glimmering glass-and-metal skyscrapers jutting up around Riyadh\u2019s King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD) feel like a declaration of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":357905,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[449,458,459,64,63,460,134,195801,14640,195802],"class_list":{"0":"post-357904","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-au","12":"tag-australia","13":"tag-design","14":"tag-entertainment","15":"tag-salone-del-mobile-riyadh","16":"tag-saudi-arabia","17":"tag-saudi-arabian-architecture"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357904"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357904\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/357905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}