Edmond Manahasa

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• Professor (Associate)
• Lecturer at Epoka University

Post-socialist urban development in the Albanian capital, Tirana, is characterized by unplanned urbanization that led to the loss of the city's historical fabric. This study focuses on a historic neighbourhood of Tirana affected by urban transformation. It defines housing as the predominant function that has influenced the morphology of the neighbo...

This study examines the relationship between place attachment and privacy within residential complexes, a typical multifamily housing form in post-socialist Tirana, characterized by dense mid/high-rise apartment blocks which drive discourse on the issue of privacy. Departing from this context this study aims to reveal the role of privacy in residen...

Purpose This study aims to identify the physical properties of the outdoor campus planning and its components in the development of a sustainable campus, regarding the socio-cultural dimension. Design/methodology/approach Studying the under-theorized concept of socio-cultural sustainability in a university campus context and exploring their fundam...

This study focuses on the post-socialist urban development that evolved in Gdańsk, Poland. It aims to evaluate the effects of an urban regeneration project implemented in Granary Island, a central historical district, on the city identity. To achieve this goal, the study measures citizens' identification by comparing both the new urban regeneration...

Purpose This research aims to develop a method for defining the identity of multilayered neighbourhoods by taking a case study in Nantes/France. It utilizes the urban identity concept to achieve this goal, which is defined by physical and identificatory relation to the neighbourhood. Design/methodology/approach The methodology includes historical...

Although mixed-use campuses are recognized by designers, little attention is paid to the social values that their outdoor environment generates for the wider community. Aiming to identify social values, the methodology used in this study includes a survey that is applied via an online questionnaire (N=156) to explore users' perceptions about the va...

This book gives an overview of the shifting paradigm from traditional design techniques and standards to new values and methods that occurred in response to confronting the COVID-19 pandemic. The theoretical studies of the phenomenon of "new normality" in architecture, urbanism and social sciences are a source of knowledge for researchers, professo...

The COVID-19 pandemic marked a threshold in everyone’s life, consequently generating new spatial paradigms in architectural and urban sphere thinking. Especially, the relationship between man and space became a major subject of interrogation. The pandemic context required distant communication, remote working and learning, and isolation. Considerin...

As the relationships between individuals, groups and space fluctuates under the influences of cultural pressures, the development of cities and the accretion of its forms is subjected to unremitting alterations. Unlike the natural growth of urban tissue that develops through predicted events, major, and often unforeseen, chaotic happenings disrupt...

This study focuses on the socialist period mass-housing typologies that emerged between the 1950s and 70s in Tirana, Albania. Being part of socialist block countries, Albania followed a selective policy regarding its masshousing development strategies. In the majority they were based on Soviet and Chinese models and reflected propagandistic narrati...

This study focusses on place attachment, taking as a case study the urban context of the post-socialist period Durrës, a city which is located in Western coast of Albania. During the post-socialist period the city was featured by frenetic and informal urban developments, which emerged as consequences of internal migration. The study aims to study t...

This study examines the change of urban identity from the socialist period to post-socialist Tirana, evaluating the role of landmarks. The continuously changing city image in the post-socialist period, associated with the construction of new high-rise buildings, is the commencement of this research. The aim is to measure to what extent the change o...

The change from socialist to capitalist political system had a deep impact in urban developments in Albania. Such impact is visible in the coastal city of Durrës, which is in western Albania. This study focusses on the examination of the concept of urban identity in post-socialist period Durrës, a city which has been subject of frenetic and dense i...

This study focuses on a critical analysis of recent restoration works of the Ottoman period mosques in Albania. During the communist period, based on Chinese model cultural revolution in 1968, religious activities were banned, and churches and mosques were closed in Albania. While churches were transformed into cinemas due to their basilica layout,...

This research focuses on the socialist period upper-class housing in the central area of Tirana. The departure point of this study is the continuous urban transformation to which the central areas of Tirana are subject in the post-socialist period, including the multifamily housing in the perimeter of the city center. The study aims to document and...

This chapter reflects on responsible science with an eye toward concrete research practice. To this end, we briefly introduce the RRI paradigm (Responsible Research and Innovation) and then highlight seven EU research projects in the context of a transnational COST Action project. This COST Action will investigate how placemaking activities, like p...

This study focuses on evaluating school spaces with children’s participation, aiming to learn its impact on children’s well-being and their involvement in school design. The study uses data from a visual and a post-occupancy evaluation (POE) questionnaire, conducted with randomly selected (N = 92) untrained children (age 10–14) and another group (N...

This paper studies nostalgia for the socialist period in Tirana departing from the city's post-socialist period frenetic urban developmental context. Informal settlements and semiformal additions characterized the post-socialist city up to the year 2000. In contrast, high-rise buildings and inner-city densification feature the later period. Such de...

This research focuses on the high-rise residential buildings, which emerged during the post-socialist period in an ex-socialist elite neighborhood of Tirana called "Bllok". This neighborhood that was dwelled exclusively by the communist party leading members and their families, in the post-socialist period has become a major entertainment zone. The...

Abstract Purpose The proposed definitional framework can be used to define housing typologies of cities in developing countries. It aims to define housing typologies in the capital city of Albania, Tirana, using the proposed hierarchical framework within the dynamics of four political periods: Ottoman, establishment, socialist and postsocialist. D...

Certain physical elements of cities' do have an inseparable role in the collective memory of citizens. These urban physical elements can be important buildings, public spaces, or streets. Our research focuses on the main boulevard of Tirana and measures the meaning and use of this place referring to the socialist period. Tirana's main boulevard was...

This research focuses on the Royal Residence of King "Zog I," located in Durres, Albania. Designed at first as presidential palace and later reconceptualized as a summer royal residence this building was subject of different architectural proposals from Armando Brasini, Kristo Sotiri, Hans Kohler, and Florestano di Fausto. This research aims to rev...

This study observes the development of gated communities and their features in the post-socialist period in capital of Albania, Tirana. The research studies the evolution of this housing typology in Tirana, by focusing in three different gated communities as case studies, including “Rolling Hills Luxury Residence”, “Kodra e Diellit” and “Touch of t...

Albania inherits a diversity of unique natural and cultural landscapes of international importance. Unfortunately, the development programs related to urbanization, infrastructure and energy investments generate significant pressures on the native quality of these landscapes. This chapter discusses further the opportunities and threats that Albania...

The shift from socialist to post-socialist political system caused an urban expansion of Tirana, which brought the growth of its population. This post-socialist urban context associated with a high demand for dwelling need, the limited construction sites in inner city and the increasing land prizes, pushed the developers to construct residential co...

This research aims to explore the possible aesthetical qualities in an informal settlement called Bathore, which evolved in the post-socialist period in capital city of Albania, Tirana. The informal settlement emerged after the fall of socialist system, due to immigration from northern and eastern Albania because of the of unemployment and economic...

This book aims to provide a cross-sectorial assessment in a multidisciplinary and trans-cultural context onto the innovations in urban and architectural approaches in designing next human environments within the Albanian context. The continuous concentration of the world population in the urban areas and their consequent densification require even...

This study focuses on the domed mosques built during the Ottoman Empire period in Prizren, a southern Kosovo city. It aims to reveal these buildings' architectural and ornamental features, emphasizing the transitional elements from cubical mass to domes. Based on on-site observation, there are examined six domed historical mosques in Prizren. The e...

This paper emphasises the attribute of Post Occupancy Evaluation (POE) in school (re) design by extending the research toward genuine participation and evaluation. It aims to re-conceptualise “child's participation” through exploring its relationship with POE by observing child-built environment connection and by demonstrating how children engage w...

This study aims to define urban identity in a post-socialist context characterised by informal settlements and high-rise edifices constructed at the expense of historical urban patterns, which drive discourse over the loss of city identity. Using the case of Tirana, the research proposes a new approach defining urban identity as consisting of two c...

The study examines the attachment to city through housing typologies in an urban context, taking the case of post-socialist Tirana, which was facing the issue of urban identity. The approach of examining attachment to city through housing typology was used because housing is observed to be the predominant morphological stock of the urban fabric, wh...

This study observes the development of gated communities and their features in the post-socialist period in capital of Albania, Tirana. The research studies the evolution of this housing form in Tirana, by focussing in three different gated communities including "Rolling Hills Luxury Residence", "Kodra e Diellit" and "Touch of the Sun” residences....

This research explores the opinion and the view of the citizens about the facades of an ex-socialist period neighbourhood, which is located between Asim Vokshi and Petro Marko streets consisting of six apartment blocks. The buildings of this quarter were part of a project called “Rebirth of the City”. This project aimed to treat the building facade...

This paper studies the environmental behavior of Tirana dwellers in a former socialist period neighborhood which has been the subject of a project called the “Rebirth of the City”. This project was an undertaking of the municipality of Tirana, the capital city of Albania, and had as its goals to stabilize the urban chaos and clean the informal cons...

The construction of mosques in Albania starts right after the Ottoman sovereignty at the end of the 14th century. The 15th and 16th century mosques were commissioned by the Ottoman administrators or by the Albanian-Ottoman nobles and the ones built after the 16th century were commissioned by the local Muslim notables. Today, only nine mosques that...

This paper discusses and critically analyzes the issue of building skyscrapers in the Main Boulevard of the capital of Albania Tirana, an urban historical zone which is defined as “City Spine” and which constitutes a very important part of architectural identity of the city. In order to give an idea about the identity of the city brief information...

This study examines the plan schemes and spatial organization of the existing mosques built during Ottoman Empire period in Albania. The historical information and partially the plan schemes are taken from the existing sources. Those buildings that had no plan schemes were taken out through surveying. The buildings are also examined on the site and...