Moroccan riad
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A riad is a traditional Moroccan house or palace with an interior garden or courtyard.
History
The word riad comes from the Arabian term for garden, Arabic: رياض, ryad.[1] The ancient Roman city of Volubilis provided a reference for the beginnings of riad architecture during the Idrisid Dynasty.[2]
When the Almoravids conquered Spain in the 11th century they sent Muslim, Christian and Jewish artisans from Spain to Morocco to work on monuments.[3]
Architecture
The Riad is the Moroccan traditional house, normally with two or more storeys around an Andalusian-style courtyard that contained a fountain. Riads were the stately city homes of the wealthiest citizens such as merchants and courtiers.[4][5]
The riads were inward focused, which allowed for family privacy and protection from the weather in Morocco. This inward focus was expressed with a centrally placed interior garden or courtyard, and the lack of large windows on the exterior walls of clay or mud brick. This design principle found support in Islamic notions of privacy, and hijab for women. Entrance to these houses encourages reflection because all of the rooms open into the central atrium space. In the central garden of traditional riads there are often four orange or lemon trees and often a fountain. The walls of the riads are adorned with tadelakt plaster and zellige tiles, usually with Arabic calligraphy of quotes from the Quran.[4][6]
The style of these riads has changed over the years, but the basic form is still used in designs today. Recently there has been a surge in interest in this form of house with a wave of renovation in towns such as Marrakech and Essaouira, where many of these often-crumbling buildings have been restored to their former glory as hotels or restaurants.[6]
See also
Notes and references
- ↑ Blaser, Werner. (2004). Courtyards in Marrakech. Basel, Switzerland: Publishers for Architecture.
- ↑ Boele, Vincent. Ed. (2005). Morocco: 5000 years of Culture. Amsterdam: KIT Publishers.
- ↑ Parker, R. (1981). A Practical Guide to Islamic Monuments in Morocco. Charlottesville, Virginia: Baraka Press. p.14
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
- ↑ Messier, Ronald A. (2010) The Almoravids and the Meanings of Jihad. Santa Barbara, California: Praeger. p.126
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.. The book provides photographs of several of the most elegantly-restored Marrakech Riads.
