TRIPOLI FACULTY OF ARCHITECTURE

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In the area, south-east of Tripoli, an orthogonal grid inspired by the model of American campuses has been developed on the typical plains covered by olive trees that border on the desert. The plot reserved for the architecture faculty lies alongside that of the new library, central element in a project aimed at renovation and expansion.

The concept rejects a hierarchical arrangement of the façades, while the references to local architectures with their closed façades which protect from the sun and the winds, look to the interior courts; this is a pretext to play with the relationship between interior and exterior, public and private.

Four volumes are arranged to form a four-leaf clover around a covered central square, crossed by the two orthogonal axes which identify the public paths. The entrances are hardly visible in the fluid continuum of the facades without sharp corners, as if modelled by the wind, and of the surfaces that are directly exposed to the sun.

The external façade features a continuous system of structural steelwork onto which gold-glazed earthenware tiles are fixed: a union between the passive technology of the sunscreen and the characteristic patterns of traditional wooden grating screens and mosques.

The protective exterior is contrasted by the interior elevations, which are completely glazed, showing the students arranged in rings on the three floors.