Magda Sibley

The University of Manchester · Manchester Architecture Research Centre (MARC)

This paper presents and evaluates initiatives taken in Morocco to reduce wood consumption, improve energy efficiency and reduce deforestation due to the operation of hammams (Turkish baths). First, the paper examines the vernacular energy systems used in heritage hammams and their lessons of sustainability. Second, it presents the problems associat...

This paper details a newly developed prototype which combines three functions: day-lighting, solar powered LED lighting and natural ventilation for the public bathhouses (known as hammams) of the heritage cities of North Africa. The prototype was developed as a result of an extensive architectural survey of 67 surviving historic baths in North Afri...

The hammams (or Islamic bath-houses), commonly known as 'Turkish baths', are one of the key urban facilities in Islamic cities. They evolved from the Roman and Byzantine public baths, as these were assimilated when the Umayyad dynasty conquered Byzantine territories in the Middle East between AD 661 and 750. Early hammams were built in the eighth c...

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) has experienced change in the development of urban planning codes, the most recent being the 2010 planning codes. Every urban planning regulation and code is devised to implement the overall urban design paradigm most suited to the city in question. For instance, the demand for modern urban facilities, coupled with...

Since the mid-1990s, the growing importance of sustainability has stimulated the development of a number of tools using sustainability indicators (SIs). SIs aim to track progress and thus lead to active choices and changes related to the built environment. Regional shopping centres in the UK consist of a complex amalgam of energy consumption, exist...

10 This special issue on hammāms in the Mediterranean addresses a research subject that has been far too long neglected. Commonly known as "Turkish baths", hammāms, or public bathhouses, were important facilities in Islamic cities. Although the institution fl ourished and spread over a large geographic area under the Ottoman Empire, the Islamic bat...

Unlike the other medinas in the Arab-Islamic world, the medina of Tripoli (capital city of Libya), has never had many historic public baths. This is probably due to a more conservative tradition where most of the Libyan women use the hamm.m only once, as part of their pre-wedding preparation and celebration. This paper presents an analysis of the t...

Hammams (Islamic bathhouses) were key buildings in the Islamic city. Despite their large number and importance within the urban fabric of historic Islamic cities, they have rarely attracted much attention either from the academic community or from organizations dealing with the conservation and restoration of historic buildings. Studies of these bu...

Measuring the level of sustainability of a construction project is difficult when dealing with qualitative data and determining the most objective method for measuring such projects as defined by various stakeholders. The issue of judgment and interpretation remains difficult as it encompasses subjectivity and differing stakeholders' perceptions in...

Hamm?ms (Islamic bathhouses) were key buildings in the Islamic city. Despite their large number and importance within the urban fabric of historic Islamic cities, they have rarely attracted much attention either from the academic community or from organizations dealing with the conservation and restoration of historic buildings. Studies of these bu...

Public baths, or hammāms, are key facilities in Islamic cities as they form part of the triad of essential urban facilities - the mosque, the hammām and the suq. They not only facilitate the accomplishment of the great ablutions that are necessary prior to praying (hence their location near mosques), they also play an important social function as t...

The public bath, or hammām, is a building type which has been integral to the urban fabric of Islamic cities. Whereas other building types have attracted much attention and research in the past, studies of hammām buildings have remained scarce and far apart. Based on surveys carried by the author on the historic public baths of Damascus and Fez, th...

In the last four decades, the combination of high population increase rate, acute shortages of housing and governments' attempts to respond quickly to a crisis situation has resulted in the wide-spread of mass housing estates the suburbs of North African cities. Four to five storey walk-up apartment bocks have become a familiar urban landscape in c...

This paper presents the study of a coastal tourism development in Algiers, Algeria. It explores the evolution of tourism in Algeria in general and the development of coastal tourist resorts in Algiers in particular. An analysis of the resort of Sidi-Fredj, near Algiers, will help to define the indicators involved in evaluating the level of sustaina...

The hammãm or Islamic public bath is a traditional building type and an important architectural and urban entity of the city (médina) in the Mediterranean Islamic world. Based on recent surveys carried out by the authors on the public baths of Cairo, Tunis, Tripoli (Libya) and Marrakech; as part of an AHRC funded project, this paper investigates th...

This is a conference paper. This paper identifies key issues surrounding the notion of a profession and its significance to art, design and architecture education. It explores similarities and differences towards an understanding of professional development by evaluating professional practice within each discipline compared to its associated educat...