Oasis
In a city where the historical Arabic maze is almost completely destroyed we define a set of garden pavilions, in an attempt to fill again what is now void with volume, and in an attempt to add public space.
This contradiction -to add build volume to create public space- is exactly what this project is about, and can only make sense in the tradition of the arabic city, where the maze, comprised of little streets and blocks, projects any publicness and open space inside the courts of the blocks composing it.
Three Garden Pavilions are thus added as light structures to the three main Sharjah Art Biennial Venues, and redefine the maze at each of these locations. The Pavilions perimeter embraces an Oasis garden and is permeable in deferent degrees depending on its location and publicness.
As light and permeable Pavilions that show glimpses of their lush garden-content, these new structures are contemporary versions of the traditional additions to the old city, where light perimeters were continuously added defining yet another courtyard.
The new Garden Pavilions apply this logic today and smuggle a set of oasis gardens for the public disguised as architecture back into the maze.
