The Siwa Oasis. Understanding the Urban Fabric and the Art of Building for a Sustainable Development

The article is part of research conducted within the “Regional Cooperation Support Programme”- APQ Countries of the Mediterranean south shore – “The Explotation of the Archaelogical Patrimony as Vehicle for the Intercultural Dialogue – Line 2.4. Dialogue and Culture” – sub project: Siwa Oasis. The two historical centres of SIwa Oasis, Shali and Agurmi, have contributed to build a concept of anthropic landscape that represents one of the best examples of environmental sustainability and energetic self-sufficiency. The traditional urban model displays an excellent adaptation to climatic conditions and use of local materials with high environmental compatibility, occurring in massive construction in Kharsif/Hirir (masonry blocks of mud mixed with salt brine), in the dense urban form, in the very close streets and shaded by the presence of Mazallah (urban covered spaces shaded that they use like piazzas). In the contemporary architecture of the Oasis, the use of new materials as concrete or Tobe (chalk block) implicates the loss of the old abandoned fabrics that can’t survive without the continuous maintenance that traditional technique of Kharsif/Hirir requires. The present study, focused on one of the expansion areas of Siwa (the Torar district), that still preserves traditional constructions, placed side by side to buildings in concrete and Tobe, wants to show that is possible to find a correct equilibrium with the local economies, through the contribution of the historical and architectural research and the understanding of the economic, social and architectural-constructive logics. In the same perspective of sustainability, the paper will also analyze the creation of new energetic self-sufficiency living units as result of the rehabilitation of the existing urban fabric in Kharsif/Hirir, combined with the introduction of new solar mirrors system in the courtyards.