Summer Program

Amid Cairo’s sweeping urban transformations, marked by demolitions, forced displacements, and the erasure of familiar cityscapes, this workshop examines what it means to archive and document the lived experiences and histories that are under threat of being lost. Here, archiving is not merely a preservation of heritage; it becomes a site of resistance, where the absence and dislocation of memory itself bear witness to the forces of erasure at work. In this context, the workshop will engage the question of how to document not only the visible loss but also the intangible—sensory experiences, emotional attachments, and the subjective landscapes of memory that traditional archives often overlook.

This workshop introduces co-production as a transformative approach in urban upgrading, offering an alternative to traditional top-down planning models. By focusing on collaborative partnerships between local communities and various stakeholders, the workshop demonstrates how co-production can foster more equitable, sustainable, and resilient urban spaces. Through a blend of theoretical exploration, practical applications, and hands-on exercises, participants will engage with methodological tools, co-planning practices, and research techniques. The workshop also addresses barriers and challenges in co-production, equipping participants with the skills to contribute to a fairer and more sustainable built environment.

This workshop introduces participants to different approaches to the built environment in critical social sciences and humanities. The main objective is to give participants the tools to situate their own understanding of the built environment – shaped by different social and educational backgrounds – with wider parallel understandings in society. The workshop’s approach is based on experiential learning, rather than reading or design work, allowing participants to gain a grasp on basic critical thinking methods through walking, note-taking, photography, film, sound, and geotagging.

This workshop delves into the dynamic relationship between our built environment and our inner world. Through physical and creative exploration, we will investigate how the spaces we move through—whether streets, squares, gardens, bridges, homes, neighborhoods, or monuments—intersect with our personal and collective histories. How do these spaces shape the stories we tell about ourselves? From these inquiries, participants will develop performance methodologies rooted in their discoveries. The workshop places particular emphasis on spoken word and narrative writing, as expressed through space, body, and voice.

This workshop introduces urban conservation practices and management policies within a historic and heritage context. The complexity of the urban fabric and the tiers of different users affect the possible interventions and decision making to create a better quality of life and experiences. These intervention and decisions are strongly related integrity, authenticity and sustainability. The participants will engage in understanding the process of creating a conservation management plan through the eyes of different stakeholders.

Despite Egypt leading the world in per capita housing production, millions here find access to adequate housing that is affordable, safe and has proper utilities, a challenge. In this hands-on workshop, participants will be introduced to Egypt's housing policies vis a vis residents’ responses to them, tracing this dichotomy over the past century. With a focus on understanding the diverse housing ecosystem, participants will examine typologies spanning tenure regimes (formal/informalized), social housing programs, commodification and financialization, and the urban-rural divide. Through legislative and data analysis, mapping, and co-production methodologies, this workshop will equip participants with practical skills and theoretical insights to reimagine how housing polices can be more just and realize the right to adequate housing in Egypt.