The Building in its Cultural Setting

The building is unusual in that it does not have peers in the previous experience of Egyptian built form. It innovates and thus adds to the architectural lexicon in both form and detailing. Its simple yet elegant design has inspired visitors and architects alike. It will undoubtedly enrich the architectural vocabulary of the next generation of architects.

By rejecting the slavish copying of past forms, or even the effort to remain rooted in place by remaining attached to a particular local tradition, the designers ran a risk. Nevertheless the Library has successfully avoided the twin dangers of ossified copying of the past and cultural inappropriateness.

The Library`s success is an immediate indictment of the kind of slavish adherence to the past and its decorative details, the kind of historical style widely criticized for superficiality and irrelevance, and which—we hope—is on its way to being totally discredited. The building can, therefore, function culturally in the local context as a liberating influence that helps local and regional architects acquire a level of sophistication in the ability to read the symbolic content of their heritage in a way that enriches their ability to produce relevant buildings for today and tomorrow. It can help liberate them from the fear that the heavy hand of the past architectural forms and details can be abandoned only at the risk of being rootless.

And Yet, there is an unusual aspect in which this building is truly related to a part of the great tradition of Muslim architecture in Egypt. It is common in many parts of Mamluk Cairo to enter large and beautiful buildings through a relatively discreet and/or broken entrance that does not reveal the full size and splendor of the space inside, allowing for the impact of discovery. This aspect is very much present in the Bibliotheca Alexandrina. It is deceptive at the entrance and the entrance hall is barely a transition. The experiential sense of discovery as the visitor walks into the building, finally discovering the splendor of the great hall with its soaring columns and its magnificent light is a re-interpretation—knowing or unknowing—of that great tradition of buildings past. It is a celebration of builders who lavished love on their designs from the largest and most general concept to the smallest detail.