zaha hadid architects: the stone towers, cairo

zaha hadid architects have designed ‘the stone towers’ – a 525,000sqm office and retail complex for the rooya group, which will be built in the stone park district of cairo, egypt. a five-star business hotel with serviced apartments, retail with food and beverage facilities and sunken landscaped gardens and plaza called the ‘delta’ is also included in the development.

hisham shokri, CEO of rooya group said: ‘there is a overwhelming need in egypt for developments of the highest international standards required by the serious and growing investment climate of the country – ultimately contributing to making it a hub for multinationals in the region. the stone towers needed an architect with daring ideas, innovation, international expertise and experience … it needed zaha hadid.’

image by methanoia studio (also main image)

‘ancient egyptian stonework incorporates a vast array of patterns and textures that, when illuminated by the intense sunlight of the region, creates animated displays of light and shadow. the facades on the north and south elevations of each building within stone towers adopts a rich vocabulary of alternating protrusions, recesses and voids to enhance the deep reveal shadow lines that accentuate the curvatures of each building within the development and animate the project throughout the day’.

‘I am delighted to be working in cairo. I have visited egypt many times and I have always been fascinated by the mathematics and arts of the arab world. in our office we have always researched the formal concepts of geometry – which relates a great deal to the region’s art traditions and sciences in terms of algebra, geometry and mathematics. this research has informed the design for stone towers. with a large-scale project such as this, care must be taken to balance a necessary requirement for repetitive elements whilst avoiding an uncompromising repetition of static building masses. the architecture of stone towers pursues a geometric rhythm of similar, interlocking, yet individually differentiated building forms that creates a cohesive composition.’ zaha hadid

image by methanoia studio