Design Handbooks by Baher Ismail farahat
Spring Handbook Arch272. Architectural design fundamentals & Model Making
an application on the restructuring researches of the first year studio with Beirut Arab Univer... more an application on the restructuring researches of the first year studio with Beirut Arab University first year students 2014-2015
Papers by Baher Ismail farahat
MSA Engineering Journal
Architecture is for everyone, thus it needs to give a chance to all individuals and groups of soc... more Architecture is for everyone, thus it needs to give a chance to all individuals and groups of society to feel included and satisfied in the various facilities and public spaces. The misconception is given when architects design built environments following the ADA regulations as a burden instead of using an innovative approach to accommodate the needs and expectations of all users. To ensure the operation of equitable spaces, an innovative architectural approach is needed. A universal space is a place where all people can fit, it is a space where people from all social categories and individual characteristics are equal and satisfied. The concept of a universal design is either used wrongly or divided into accessible or / and inclusive architecture. Therefore, the aim of this research is to investigate the significance of universal design and to put down relevant assessment criteria in order to create spaces and environments that everyone can use without feeling any discrimination. This research uses a scientific methodology to accomplish its goal by first reading the literature on universal design and its application in the design of spaces, and then by examining and comparing four chosen case studies: KWK Promes' Przelomy centre for dialogue and Steven Holl's winter visual art centre as international examples, Snohetta's Bibliotheca Alexandrina as a regional example and Zaha Hadid's Issam Fares Institute as a local example. These facts support the authors' argument that universal design is a solid starting point for appropriate design solutions to increase the equity of spaces and respond to the abilities and needs of a variety of users. As guidelines for the design of spaces, a series of recommendations are made about the effective use of this architectural approach.
MSA Engineering Journal
Today, the need for designing appropriate housing spaces becomes a fundamental aspect of architec... more Today, the need for designing appropriate housing spaces becomes a fundamental aspect of architecture. To ensure the operation of these spaces and their sustainability, an architectural approach is needed. Transformable architecture, which encompasses designs that can be transformed according to different functions and used for many purposes, is the architectural approach for enhancing housing spaces that might adapt with the ongoing process of changing needs. Hence, architects are challenged to create innovative spaces to satisfy the needs of all users. Therefore, the main aim of this research is to explore the role of transformable architecture in redefining contemporary housing spaces in respect to the various needs of users in different psychological, environmental and economic contexts. To achieve this aim, this research employs a scientific methodology starting by reviewing the literature that provides knowledge about transformable architecture and its implementation in contemporary housing spaces; then analyzing four selected international case studies: Suitcase house in China, Safe house in Poland, Living Room House in Germany, and Sharifi-ha House in Iran and comparing them. These facts serve as the foundation for the authors' argument that transformable architecture is a good stand point for suitable design strategies to improve the functionality of housing spaces and to respond to diverse users' needs. A set of recommendations regarding the application of this architectural approach are drawn as guidelines in designing contemporary housing spaces.
Architecture and Planning Journal (APJ), 2015
Edulearn11 Proceedings, 2011
In any academic institution, which offers a professional degree in architecture, the question of ... more In any academic institution, which offers a professional degree in architecture, the question of the relationship between the education provided and the skills required for successful practice, is obviously of paramount importance. Consequently, the design and the overall philosophy of the curriculum has attain a congruency between knowledge provided in the school and the role of the architects in society, where the justification of architecture as a profession will be in providing better environments for contemporary societies. In recent years, the profession of architecture has changed, but the educational process, especially in Middle Eastern architectural education, has been slow to respond to this change. There appears that there is a growing dissatisfaction with the current situation in Middle Eastern education, since several educators and researcher voiced the thought that architectural education needs to be more responsible to the social demands of contemporary societies. Unfortunately, however, few attempts have been made in this realm. Where consensus is lacking on the issue of what changes in Middle Eastern architectural education will best support the society's needs and the future of the profession, this research proposes an intellectual framework within which architectural educators can envision the socio-culture demands placed in the profession by society and type of education that satisfies these demands. This research is divided into several sections. The first is to conceptualize the problem of architectural education in the Middle East. The second is to develop an argument in response to these problems. Such argument is devoted to answer basic questions about what is architecture. What is architectural design? Relationship between architecture and culture? The third describes and analyzes an experience in designing a new curriculum for undergraduate university education in architecture (Misr International University).This curriculum would respond to the problems of the current architectural education, and the needs of the profession and society.
Architecture and Planning Journal (APJ)
Children's play areas are from the past an indispensable right for children, in which it allows c... more Children's play areas are from the past an indispensable right for children, in which it allows children to build their physical environment and assess it cognitive thinking. But today, the city, especially in lowincome population suffers from a clear shortage of open spaces, where the leftover spaces are left empty used for garbage, old tanks car parts, and many other bad issues. This has negatively affected society, mainly children, where they become vulnerable to many social ills and problems that threaten their lives and behaviour. This paper tries to ameliorate and presents adequate children's play areas, for the low-income population, through an analytical example, suffering from a lack of playing spaces between residential buildings, and show us how responsible and associations find a clear and appropriate solution for their society. For that reason, the paper focuses on principles of how to present safe playing areas and to be accessible by all children without inequality between boys and girls, and it also presents a case study that analyses the current situation presented in this region, in order to solve it. Moreover, the paper declares that the low-income population living in the high-density urban fabric, can manage and form suitable public and kid's gatherings, or may take advantage of good use of existing public open areas, where these can improve social relations and develop children's physical environment. In order to survey the current situation of the case study, Sabra, the paper follows a field methodology using a questionnaire. This methodology shows the complications of low-income Sabra inhabitants and children and concluded with guidelines to ameliorate and enhance the quality of life and upgrade adequate outdoor spaces for play.
Historical preservation helps keep communities beautiful, vibrant and livable, and gives people a... more Historical preservation helps keep communities beautiful, vibrant and livable, and gives people a stake in their surroundings, for the fact that such historical and valuable places provide a sense of stability and a tangible link with the past (historichawaii.org Feb.2020). Historical places constitute a valuable front for cities with a well-known identity that lasted for centuries. Focusing on developing these places to ensure their sustainability and preserving their history constitutes a mission that has impact not only on the urban environment but also on people using it. Fundamentally, cities bring creative and productive people together helping them to do what they do best: exchange, create and innovate. Culture lies at the heart of urban renewal and innovation.(Culture: urban future: global report on culture for sustainable urban development, Unesco 2016). Al-Muizz Street, an urban space in Cairo, Egypt is the study of this research that aims, first, to assess the current sit...
Baher Ismail Farahat Beirut Arab University – Beirut – Lebanon ABSTRACT This research describes t... more Baher Ismail Farahat Beirut Arab University – Beirut – Lebanon ABSTRACT This research describes the nature of the relationship between fashion and architectural design. The most logical relationship is that both fashion and architecture provides a shelter for people in different social dimensions. Both fields passed through several era were design transits from the complexity to the modernity and simplicity of design. On the other hand, there are many similarities in materials characteristics although both fields use totally different martial on different scale. In addition, there are many examples that show the effect of one field on the other one. Many architects are inspired by a garment to design a building and it is the same in the other way round. So this study explores if these two fields have any effect on each other. so how these effects are reflected at the end.
The quality of built environment plays an essential role in defining human behavior. Nowadays, in... more The quality of built environment plays an essential role in defining human behavior. Nowadays, individuals spend most of their lifetime within all types of built environments, in particular, in work environment. Employees aspire for workspaces where they can fulfill their potential and satisfy their needs. Therefore, the design of workspaces is facing major challenges and requires several transformations in order to meet the various and diversifying demands and expectations of employees. The purpose of this research is to investigate the importance of improving the quality of workspaces. This research analyses the relationship between the quality of workspaces and the performance of employees. It explores the architectural design principles and environmental conditions leading to the quality of workspaces. Moreover, it sheds light on the existing of greenery within these workspaces. A qualitative research approach is used in this research. Two national case studies are taken into consideration; each case study is analyzed based on predetermined parameters. The sample of research is selected randomly and an interview is separately conducted. The results confirmed that both two cases meet the requirements of quality, relevant to the workspaces' design; as well as it showed that the employees had reported an increase in their performance. These results emphasize the necessity to create more national workspaces, implementing the concepts of quality and adopting international criteria of design for a better human performance.
HBRC Journal, 2017
This paper is a model for the Tourism and Culture-led Revitalization in valuable areas which make... more This paper is a model for the Tourism and Culture-led Revitalization in valuable areas which makes special emphasize on revitalizing the waterfront of Saida. To revitalize valuable areas, countries are attempting to attract new activities; a key new activity has been tourism and associated culture activities. Strategies for tourism and culture-led revitalization have encouraged the exploitation of the area's historic legacy for tourist development. Such development has usually meant a partial or extensive restructuring of the area's economic base. Saida has been a major touristic city but it lost its regional importance because of lack of touristic and entertaining facilities. Therefore, in order to encourage the tourism in Saida and to fully exploit the sea which is the most important feature in the city, we suggest that there must be a new building complex to fulfill the above needs by making a new maritime portal and a 5 stars Hotel in order to activate the urban tourism. Moreover, it sheds light on the weak points of the Lebanese local tourism and it suggests a new solution to develop the official economical governmental income. It develops a methodology based on a specific site analysis working on the proposed urban tissue of Saida.
HBRC Journal, 2016
Some movements within modern architecture particularly emphasize the importance of matching build... more Some movements within modern architecture particularly emphasize the importance of matching buildings to their surroundings. However, practicing such ''contextual architecture" is highly challenging and typically not something the future inhabitants of a building are well equipped for participating in. This paper attempts to be a new vision to design an important building in such sensitive places, for example, designing a museum in a historical context. The methodology of the study is a qualitative method based on a theoretical foundation. It sheds light on the concepts and definition of museums and contextualism, and answers the main question proposed in this paper: ''How can we design a huge and important building such as a museum in historical context while respecting its importance and at the same time avoiding the deterioration of this historical place?" And based on answering the sub following questions too: What is the museum concept? What are the activities and functions of this prototype? What is the museum form and morphology? What are the types of contextual design? What are the strategies of contextual design? This part ends with electing some criteria that will be used as basis for the practical part. And thus it can be concluded the ideal strategy for designing a museum in historical context. Discussion of the findings is expected to enrich the talk in that domain.
The private universities in Egypt were initiated based on a presidential decree in 1996. Since th... more The private universities in Egypt were initiated based on a presidential decree in 1996. Since then, a number of universities were open, with two different opposing perspectives for two different parties of stakeholders. The first was the hope of the educators and of many parents to achieve quality education away from the typical bureaucratic governmental university education that has been long deteriorated according to several factors out of scope of this paper. On the other hand, was the dream of a number of investors and other parents of less able and less qualified students to acquire a paidfor university graduation certificate with the least effort. The paper at hand tackles this issue. Aiming at evaluating the experiment of quality assurance of private education in Egypt. The paper dissects the concept of the private education in Egypt through reviewing an experiment of a quality assurance project of the architectural programs in one of the renowned private universities in Egy...
HBRC Journal, 2021
This paper explores the impact of the living heritage approach for sustainable
tourism & economic... more This paper explores the impact of the living heritage approach for sustainable
tourism & economics in Mount Lebanon. The proposed living heritage model is
separated into three fundamental actions: firstly, the identification of important
historical places and buildings that are reused to serve conservation and tourism development, as well as the participation of the core community in determining this. Secondly, the development of a tourism strategy and development
plans, in which the local community must also participate. Thirdly, the development of maintenance and control programs, which must be supervised by
the local community through its partnership with the Ministry and those
responsible for conservation operations. Moreover, the hypothesis is to find
a way to implement the living heritage in a local rural context. It also tackles
different ways of implementing the living heritage approach based on international case studies (Albergo Diffuso, in Italy and the Meteora, in Greece), to
inform sustainable economic and tourism development in the local rural context of Mount Lebanon. The methodological study will take into consideration
two analyses: a theoretical (literature reviews and main definitions) and
a practical (comparative analysis and case studies). In conclusion, several strategies can be taken into account in order to attain a successful living heritage of
sustainable economics and tourism in Mount Lebanon. In fact, such a goal will
be achieved through the partnership among private, public, and local sectors
that can create a strong historical-touristic-economic bond.
KEYWORDS Living heritage; Albergo Diffuso (AD); tourism policies; local rural context; sustainable
tourism; cultural heritage; urban conservation
JES. Journal of Engineering Sciences
The main objectives of this paper are: To discover new facts related to the museums evolution thr... more The main objectives of this paper are: To discover new facts related to the museums evolution throughout history till now, to verify the impact of technology on the museums, to analyze the process through which the evolution of museums took place, and to identify the relationship between the main definition of a museum and the emerged museum buildings, in order to achieve the paper main objectives, data presented traces the history of museums, first by noting the etymology of the word museum and its derivatives, next by describing the private collecting conducted in ancient and medieval times, reviewing the development of modern public museums from the Renaissance to the present day, and finally keeping shedding the light on the role of technology on the modern development and transformation of museums, the functionalities of the traditional typologies and the evolution of new ones, the paper hypothesis to be tested is: The historical target of museums had been subjected to many modifications due to the technological, political and social modifications that have altered the general mission of the museum as the house of collections, the conclusion of the paper would be showing whether the actual mission of museums today is still taken into consideration within the new typologies as well as deriving the attained result after all the presented information to derive a general result proving the hypothesis stated, architecture is a clear reflection of the society, so it is subjected to dramatic changes, therefore it is not appropriate to design today in the manners, ideas, and believes of yesterday.
JES. Journal of Engineering Sciences
The main objectives of this paper are: To discover new facts related to the museums evolution thr... more The main objectives of this paper are: To discover new facts related to the museums evolution throughout history till now, to verify the impact of technology on the museums, to analyze the process through which the evolution of museums took place, and to identify the relationship between the main definition of a museum and the emerged museum buildings, in order to achieve the paper main objectives, data presented traces the history of museums, first by noting the etymology of the word museum and its derivatives, next by describing the private collecting conducted in ancient and medieval times, reviewing the development of modern public museums from the Renaissance to the present day, and finally keeping shedding the light on the role of technology on the modern development and transformation of museums, the functionalities of the traditional typologies and the evolution of new ones, the paper hypothesis to be tested is: The historical target of museums had been subjected to many modifications due to the technological, political and social modifications that have altered the general mission of the museum as the house of collections, the conclusion of the paper would be showing whether the actual mission of museums today is still taken into consideration within the new typologies as well as deriving the attained result after all the presented information to derive a general result proving the hypothesis stated, architecture is a clear reflection of the society, so it is subjected to dramatic changes, therefore it is not appropriate to design today in the manners, ideas, and believes of yesterday.
Architecture Research, 2012
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Design Handbooks by Baher Ismail farahat
Papers by Baher Ismail farahat
tourism & economics in Mount Lebanon. The proposed living heritage model is
separated into three fundamental actions: firstly, the identification of important
historical places and buildings that are reused to serve conservation and tourism development, as well as the participation of the core community in determining this. Secondly, the development of a tourism strategy and development
plans, in which the local community must also participate. Thirdly, the development of maintenance and control programs, which must be supervised by
the local community through its partnership with the Ministry and those
responsible for conservation operations. Moreover, the hypothesis is to find
a way to implement the living heritage in a local rural context. It also tackles
different ways of implementing the living heritage approach based on international case studies (Albergo Diffuso, in Italy and the Meteora, in Greece), to
inform sustainable economic and tourism development in the local rural context of Mount Lebanon. The methodological study will take into consideration
two analyses: a theoretical (literature reviews and main definitions) and
a practical (comparative analysis and case studies). In conclusion, several strategies can be taken into account in order to attain a successful living heritage of
sustainable economics and tourism in Mount Lebanon. In fact, such a goal will
be achieved through the partnership among private, public, and local sectors
that can create a strong historical-touristic-economic bond.
KEYWORDS Living heritage; Albergo Diffuso (AD); tourism policies; local rural context; sustainable
tourism; cultural heritage; urban conservation
tourism & economics in Mount Lebanon. The proposed living heritage model is
separated into three fundamental actions: firstly, the identification of important
historical places and buildings that are reused to serve conservation and tourism development, as well as the participation of the core community in determining this. Secondly, the development of a tourism strategy and development
plans, in which the local community must also participate. Thirdly, the development of maintenance and control programs, which must be supervised by
the local community through its partnership with the Ministry and those
responsible for conservation operations. Moreover, the hypothesis is to find
a way to implement the living heritage in a local rural context. It also tackles
different ways of implementing the living heritage approach based on international case studies (Albergo Diffuso, in Italy and the Meteora, in Greece), to
inform sustainable economic and tourism development in the local rural context of Mount Lebanon. The methodological study will take into consideration
two analyses: a theoretical (literature reviews and main definitions) and
a practical (comparative analysis and case studies). In conclusion, several strategies can be taken into account in order to attain a successful living heritage of
sustainable economics and tourism in Mount Lebanon. In fact, such a goal will
be achieved through the partnership among private, public, and local sectors
that can create a strong historical-touristic-economic bond.
KEYWORDS Living heritage; Albergo Diffuso (AD); tourism policies; local rural context; sustainable
tourism; cultural heritage; urban conservation